Monday 23 May 2016

Book Review - Dumplin' By Julie Murphy

Dumplin' is a stand alone novel by Julie Murphy.
Dumplin'

It follows a girl, Willowdean, who is nicknamed Dumplin' by her mam. Willowdean is a fat girl but has always been comfortable in her own skin. She never worries about what people think and with her best friend Ellen with her all the time, her life is pretty good. Then, she takes a job in a local fast-food take away where she meets a boy named Bo. Will becomes attracted to him but when she finds out he likes her back, she's very surprised. As their relationship grows, Will finds that her confidence is dropping and in order to get it back she decided to enter the Miss Teen Blue Bonnet Pageant with several other girls that are like her.

This book was so inspiring. Willow was an amazing heroine to read about and her fearlessness was very powerful. Julie Murphy wrote her story so well and so true that is was impossible to get bored. It was such an addictive read and Will's character is one I won't forget for a long time. Some parts of it were very funny and I found myself laughing a lot at times. Will's relationship with Bo was quite complicated but this made it feel as if it was real. I found no flaws in this novel so I rate it a 5/5 stars.

I think this is a really important story line in novels and I hope you all give it a chance.

Leah.

Saturday 21 May 2016

Book Review - The Heart of Betrayal By Mary E. Pearson

The Heart Of Betrayal is the Sequel to The Kiss Of Deception by Mary E. Pearson.

The Heart of BetrayalI won't talk about the plot of this book because I don't want to spoil any of you on the results of book 1 in this series, so make sure you read my review for The Kiss Of Deception because it might be something you're interested in. I'm going to go straight into what I thought now and I hope you all will try out this series because I think it has something special.

This book was beautifully written, just like the first. The plot did not fail to disappoint in any way and I was completely satisfied with all the events that happened. Again, there was not much action in it and Lia was basically just in the same place but the whole time I could sense something building and it really added to the suspense of the story. I read this in a short period of time and I cannot wait for the third book, The Beauty of Darkness, to be released in August. This book deserves a 5/5 stars!

I hope my reviews for this series has encouraged you to read it and if you do, do not forget to tell me because I'd love to know that my posts are of some use to you.

Leah.

Book Review - The Kiss Of Deception By Mary E. Pearson

The Kiss Of Deception is the first book in The Remnant Chronicles by Mary E. Pearson.

The Kiss of DeceptionIt follows a princess named Lia who flees her kingdom on her wedding day to avoid an arranged marriage that was supposed to secure an alliance with another kingdom. She settles in a small village and starts getting used to her life there until two mysterious men arrive. Lia doesn't know it yet but these men are the prince she was engaged to and an assassin that was sent to kill her. 

The story evolves from there and I never became bored with it. Although I couldn't really say there was must action in it, it still captivated me. Lia was a brilliant heroine and as the book developed I became more and more involved in her story. The prince and the assassin were great too and we got to hear from their perspectives as well as Lia's, which was interesting. A lot of the book was just Lia at the village yet the author wrote it so well it was a really quick read. The only problem that I found with this was that I had the prince and the assassin mixed up for the majority of the book. it was probably just something that happened to me though. So, I rate this book a 4/5 stars.

I highly recommend The Kiss Of Deception and don't be put off by the lack of action in it because it really doesn't affect it negatively. Send me a comment if you thought about this book differently or if this post has made you want to read it!

Leah.

Saturday 7 May 2016

Book Review - Fangirl By Rainbow Rowell

This is another contemporary stand-alone novel by Rainbow Rowell.

It follows a set of twins, Cath and Wren, who are going to college. Wren is very sociable and outgoing while Cath is the total opposite and likes to write fan fiction. It follows their journey through college, how Wren and Cath drift apart and don't do as much together as they used to and the story of Cath's fan fic. When Cath meets her roommate's boyfriend, she may have to step out of her comfort zone a bit. 

I liked this book but I didn't think it was brilliant or anything. I don't really understand where all the hype is coming from. I know that sounds as if I really don't like it but there were some aspects I really enjoyed and some that I really didn't, so it's kind of mixed feelings for me. I really liked Cath, I thought she was easy to relate to, but I didn't like the whole fan fiction part. There were pages of the actual fan fiction she was writing throughout the book and I just ended up skipping them. The romance was quite cute and I did enjoy reading that part of it. I also thought that it was dragged out too much and a lot of it seemed to be just Cath sitting in her room. Overall I'd just give it a 3.5/5 stars, it's still a pretty ok rating because, as I said, there were some aspects that I did enjoy.

I hope I didn't put you guys off too much because that's just my feelings towards this novel. If you do read it and have your own opinion please leave a comment so I can know.

Leah.

Book Review - Eleanor and Park By Rainbow Rowell

Eleanor & ParkThis book is a contemporary, stand alone novel by Rainbow Rowell.

It's about two teenagers, Eleanor and Park, quite obviously. Eleanor moves to a new school and already she is an outsider. She begins to get to know Park, who sits beside her on the bus, and they fall in love.

There is not much more to this novel than that because it's just a romance, but there are other issues involved too. Eleanor's family life is very hard and things like abuse show up, which I found very hard to read. I felt so sorry for her and upset but that really shows how well it was written. I really liked Eleanor as a character and she was so strong despite everything that was happening to her. I give it 4/5 stars just because at times I found it hard to process. I liked that even though the romance was the main focus, there were other aspects threaded through the story also. 

I highly recommend this book as a quick, cute but thought provoking novel.

Leah.

Book Review - The Death Code By Lindsay Cummings

The Death Code is the second and final book to The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings.

The Murder Complex #2: The Death CodeI'm not going to talk about the plot in this review because I do not want to give away anything that happens in the first book so I'm just going to go straight to talking about what I thought of it.

The Death Code was brilliant. When I finished the first book I thought it was going to be so hard for the author to finish the plot in just one more book, but she did a great job. It was not rushed in any way and it definitely did not disappoint as a sequel. I read it in one go and the writing flowed so well. It had me on the edge of my seat throughout the climax and I felt like I was actually there too. More characters were introduced in this one but they were all great. The end was very satisfying but I still wished the story wasn't over because I didn't want to leave Meadow and Zephyr behind. Again, the amount of gore and that sort of thing was similar to what was in The Murder Complex so if you read the first one you should be fine and if you can't stomach it, do not read it because it does appear quite visual. I rate this book 5/5 stars! The only bad thing about this book is that I think the cover is significantly uglier than the first one, which I love, but that doesn't effect my rating.

Read this series, it's amazing!! But not too good if you're looking for some comic relief, haha.

Leah.




Book Review - The Murder Complex By Lindsay Cummings

The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings is the first book in her YA, dystopian series of two books.
The Murder Complex
It follows a 15 year old girl named Meadow who is trained to kill and survive and a boy named Zephyr who both live in a society where the murder rate is greater than the birth rate. This is because a way to prevent all kinds of natural deaths, e.g. illness, were invented and in order to keep the population down an organisation had to be set up to keep the population steady.  This organisation takes people, like Zephyr, and turns them into programmed assassins. Zephyr doesn't know what he is yet and when he meets Meadow the story really begins to evolve.

I loved this book. Meadow as a character was really strong and independent and the book swapped between perspectives from Meadow and Zephyr so we got the picture of the story from each of the main characters. The plot was amazing and I've never read anything like this one before. However, it was quite bloody and gory and dark so if you don't like that sort of thing I would not recommend it. Other than that though I would definitely recommend it to you guys if you are into this genre. It was so unique and the characters were brilliantly written and you could hear their different voices in the perspectives and I never had to go back to the start of a chapter to remember who was speaking. I rate this book 5/5 stars and this series is definitely added to one of my all time favourites.

Read this book and tell me what you think of it!!!
Leah.