April Wrap Up

I set out to read a bunch of stuff in April, you can see my TBR post here if you like.  I did pretty well.  I didn't get to everything, but I got to most of the stuff I intended to, plus a couple of things I didn't plan on reading.  I read or listened to 10 books total and started 2 that were on my list to read.  And I reviewed almost all of them, which is more of an accomplishment than actually reading the books.  Reading is the easy part, finding time to post reviews is the hard part.  I have a few more to review, but I'm almost caught up.  I'll update the links when I'm done.

Ebooks/ARCs I did read, I've put their goodreads links and links to all of my reviews below so you can go check them out:

• Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
• My review
• I finished this and it was fantastic.  I highly recommend it.  I hear the audio version is fantastic as well.  
• Unbreakable by Sara Ella
• My review
• This took me almost a month to finish.  I'm sorry to say I didn't enjoy it as much as the first 2 books.  
• Kissing Tolstoy by Penny Reid
• My review
• This popped up randomly as an auto checkout from my library, which means they bought it on recommendation and I was next in line for it on the holds list.  This was really short and cute and I read it in a couple of hours.
• Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas
• My review
• This was a surprise release by Pen Douglas.  It just came out mid-April, and I was lucky enough to win a copy in a giveaway hosted by The Lovely Books.  I really like her work, and I've read most of her books but I don't think I've reviewed any of them, yet.  I think I read them before I started on this blog journey.  I joined the blog tour so I had to squeeze this in to April's list.

Things I meant to read but will move to May:

• Furyborn by Claire Legrand
• I started this but I haven't finished it.  It is much longer than I anticipated.  It is really good.  There are angels, elemental powers, spies, assassins, prophecies, so there's alot going on.
• Smart but Scattered by Peg Dawson
• I started this, but as I mentioned in my TBR, I didn't plan to finish it in April.  My goal was to start it.  I've read the first few chapters and I've learned quite a bit.  It has already give me some good insights into parenting.  I have 2 very intellegent children, but they both lack what I consider basic human skills.  I'm hoping this book can teach our whole family how work on those things and face the world more effectively.  So far so good.
• Lucky Charm and Charmed by J.A. Armitage
• I need to to get to both of these in May.
• Beard in Mind and Beard Science by Penny Reid
• I know I'm going to love these and I fly through them so they will happen very soon.  The next one in the series is coming out in July and I want to be caught up by then.
• Restore Me by Tahereh Mafi
• I keep extending my hold on this.  I really want to get to it.

Audio Books

I finished all of the books but one.

• The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss
• I just checked this out today, so it is next up.
• Timekeeper by Tara Sim
• My review
• I really enjoyed this one.  I was expecting it to be about time travel, but there is no time travel involved.  Time control perhaps, but no travelling.  This has an LGBT male main character who fixes clocks and can feel and see time unlike us regular people.  I liked the premise and I'm anxious to continue.  My library just purchased Chainbreaker, and I'm currently listening to it now.
• One Dark Throne by Kendare Blake
• My review
• This was another random checkout.  I forgot all about this series until I saw the cover in the available now section and I grabbed it.  I really liked the first book, but you know how it goes waiting a year for the next book to come out.  The 2nd book was a great follow up to Three Dark Crowns and I loved being back in the world and getting to know the Queens better.  I put the 2 novellas on hold as soon as I finished but it looks like I'll be waiting a while until we find out what happens to the sisters.
• Every Little Thing by Samantha Young
• My review
• Sam is one of my favorites, but this isn't my favorite book.  I haven't loved her books on audio.  I think I prefer to read them on the page.  It was still good, but the romance in this lost some thing for me in the translation.  I think I'll stick to reading her books in print.  This is still a good hate to love romance, and still recommend it.
•   Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
• My review
• This isn't my normal type of book but I really did enjoy it.  It hits on just about every problem facing today's society.  I was surprised how much I enjoyed it.  
• Walk on Earth a Stranger, Like a River Glorious, and Into the Bright Unknown by Rae Carson
• My review
• I picked this up randomly because I heard Regan from Peruse Project talk about it and she said it was good.  I needed a new audio book an this was available so I took a chance.  I really ended up liking it and checked out the next 2 books.  The books aren't terribly long, but I really liked the Oregon Trail vibe.  The series follows Leah a girl who can sense gold during the California gold rush.  I really enjoyed the series.

Review: Unbreakable by Sara Ella

Unbreakable by Sara Ella
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be published on May 1, 2018.  If you enjoyed Unblemished and Unraveling, I do recommend reading this to find out how it ends.

I hate to do this, but I really struggled with this book. My review is going to be critical. I’m OK with the ending but I did not enjoy how we got there in this installment. It took far too long to resolve things from the 2nd book and actually get to the plot of the 3rd book. I enjoyed Unblemished and Unraveling, but it took me almost a month to finish this book and that is rare. I typically finish a book in a few days, especially if it is YA. I found the writing to be very immature in this book. I didn’t find that to be the case in the first two books. The things the characters say are phrases I expect from a child, not from teenagers. They act like petulant children, not like warriors who have faced and overcome struggles in their lives that the first two books have outlined. While they all have baggage, the actions and dialogue of the adults and teens in this installment were just too immature for my taste and they didn’t fit with the other books.

There wasn’t much character development in this book. We started to see some of the characters develop in book 2. The concept of loving yourself and not needing a boy to make you strong were apparent, but again immaturity struck and I felt that the characters just didn’t really develop much. There are moments when I really respected how far our main character Eliyana Ember, also known as El and Em, has developed throughout the series. Then in the next section she is a sniveling child. In the end she finds her strength and comes to love herself, but I found the conclusion to that plot line very weak and poorly written. Much of her development was centered around the love triangle, not self love as I think the author intended. Atleast that’s how I was left feeling after it was all over. Joshua and Ky are both fighting the Void, but it doesn’t really change their character. They are both the same as they always were. The characters don’t really develop beyond who they were in the beginning. They make some critical decisions that guide the plot, but it doesn’t really impact their development. Ebony on the other hand changes quite a bit from the first book to the last. Much like book 2 there is quite a bit of inner monologue going on and we get a lot of Ebony’s inner perspective about why she is the way she is and what she is feeling. She wants her mother’s acceptance and love, and nothing she ever did was good enough. We come to find that while she puts on a tough exterior, she may just be as broken as everyone else on the inside. Her inner monologue got to be a bit much after a while, especially with the immaturity of the writing. I do like the plot twist at the end that involved Ebony, thought. I didn’t quite see that coming.

I found it very hard to keep track of which perspective we were following. Now I was reading an ARC, and I’m hopeful that in the final edits of the book the chapter headings will include a note about which character we are following. If the final copy doesn’t, it should. The plot, like the perspectives jumped around so much, I never knew what was going on in the book. I often had to go back and reread pages because I felt like I missed something. In the end I realized, the content just wasn’t there. The ending gives enough closure to make the series feel complete but it felt rushed and just very convenient. I didn’t like spending so much time in the character’s heads again. There was a lot of inner thought going on and the characters having conversations with themselves instead of the other characters or words on the page moving the plot forward.

There was so much potential with this series. It was original with the magic system and the fantasy elements. I really liked where it was going with the concept of the Void and the Verity and the different Reflections. While I still feel that the while Void and Verity thing could have been flushed out and explained better, I think the concept was good. The idea of the Reflections and the thresholds was a really unique take on different dimensions existing at once, I just think the execution in book 3 could have been a little stronger. I liked the kind of fairy tale elements that were brought into the story. I just don’t like the way this last book was written. The writing was jumbled and confusing. The plot was all over the place and it didn’t make for an enjoyable reading experience for me.

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Review: Unraveling by Sara Ella

Unraveling by Sara Ella
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Thomas Nelson Fiction and Netgalley for providing me an advanced reader copy.

Unraveling picks up shortly after Unblemished (book #1) leaves off. El is the vessel of the Verity and she is about to become queen, Ky has left her without a word, and Joshua is by her side and wants to be with her. Everything seems perfect, but we quickly find out that all is not well.

Much like the first book I was a bit overwhelmed with all of the stuff going on and it took my a while to figure out what was going on. The book jumps around alot from El and Joshua's perspective, and we even get a few chapters of Ky's perspective. Everyone is researching the Verity and the Void, and it jumps from El speaking, to El thinking, to El reading, and it was sometimes hard to keep track of who voice we were truly hearing. I really appreciated getting more backstory on the Verity and the Void. I felt pretty confused at the end of book 1, but I really feel like the Void and Verity concept was developed alot more in book 2. I like where it is heading and feel much more comfortable with the concept and where that part of the plot is going. With El being the Verity's vessel, and the Void being split between both Ky and Joshua, El is on a mission to destroy the Void and free both boys she cares about and save the the Callings and the Thresholds from disappearing. As they learn more and more about the history of the Verity and the Void, the Fairy Queen becomes more and more important to the story.

I really liked the relationship development between Ebony and El, I wasn't sure where that was headed but I like where it went. I'd like to see that same type of development with their other sister Khloe. The love triangle, but there are hints that it might actually be a square, comes on really strong. El is still pretty love sick for Joshua in the second installment, and she is still pretty unsure of herself. Many of her actions are driven by Joshua's influence or her memories of Joshua. I thought that she had finally broken through the "I'm worthless because of my birthmark" thing at the end of book one, but that theme emerges again in book 2 and she still feels those same emotions of worthlessness. I do like that the story make a play to build her up and work with her abilities to make her strong on her own. Her journey of self discovery is still centered around the boys, but she kind of figured out how to break away from them and find her way on her own.

I'm anxious to see where book 3 takes us. If Josh/Joshua can fight the Void and if the Void can truly be destroyed. I really enjoyed book 2 and liked where things ended and feel like things ended in a good place.

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Review: Unblemished by Sara Ella

Unblemished by Sara Ella
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Thomas Nelson Fiction and Netgalley for providing me an advanced reader copy. This has been out for some time already so I'm not sure how much the ARC differs from the final copy.  The next book, Unraveled will be out in July.  I received an ARC of that today, so look for a review of that in the next week or so.

This book is like Alice in Wonderland meets The Mortal Instruments. Unblemished follows Eliyana or El, a girl who has lived a pretty sheltered life due to a fairly unsightly birthmark on her face and has had a rough go at it because of it. Her birthmark in one world is ugly but in another Reflection or dimension is actually a mark of something exceptional. The plot starts out with a story we've seen before, chosen one has been hidden away until her 18th birthday for her own protection, when all of a sudden crazy stuff starts happening and she has to save the world with her magic.  Oh and there are two boys and a love triangle.

In this story there is a ton of family drama, starting with the death of El's mom and things just kind of get more chaotic from there. Her best friend Joshua ends up being her guardian in both the legal and magical protector sense, and El is dragged quite literally into a world she never knew existed. The unique twist was on the magic system and the world building. I really enjoyed the aspect of the reflections, a kind of multi-dimensional world accessed through Thresholds, where each is kind of a mirror image of the other. I really liked the Callings, some of the people in the magical part of the world whether light or dark has an ability and there weren't too many.  Sometimes when the people in a book have abilities there are way to many to keep track of, this one only had 7 so it wasn't too confusing.  I did find alot of the rest of the magic system pretty confusing though.  I thought that the Verity and Void, aka light and dark, could have been explained a little better. El's whole story is based on her being tied to the Verity and saving everyone, but I'm still a little confused about the whole Verity and Void concept as it applies to the vessels and the Kisses of Infinity.

Love plays a big part in the storyline, and I was hoping that El would eventually come to love herself as she was pretty self loathing about her birthmark and the fact that Joshua wouldn't love her back for much of the book. She seemed very love sick and immature in the beginning, but eventually she kind of figured out what she needed to do. I kind of didn't like her in the beginning, she was weak and always having a tantrum, but given all she was going through I guess that was kind of acceptable. She eventually accepted her fate as the savior and grew up a bit, and I ended up liking her by the end. I liked the kind of twist at the end regarding the love triangle where both boys have equal claim, and you just don't know where either of them stand. I know who I want her to end up with and I think I know where things are heading, but I'm not sure where the story is actually going to head. I kind of like that. I'm anxious to get to the 2nd book.