A Gathering of Shadows Review

I recently just finished A Darker Shade of Magic which is the first book in this series and loved it. This book takes place four months after the events of the first book. As I had said in my review of the first book, the first book could've ended as a standalone and I still believe that after reading this book.

Not a whole lot happens in this book to be quite honest with you. I was left very unimpressed with the plot because there was none. This book didn't advance the plot in anyway. Was it entertaining? Sure. Was it interesting? Sort of. After this book, I lost my love with this series. I wanted more. I wanted more with Black London and the magic and everything else. Instead, Lila is all the sudden a magician and may be an Antari at that and we're left with quite a cliffhanger. This story also had the games and only the last 3 pages finally had action at the meet up between Kell and Holland. By then it was too late to salvage my feelings towards this book. I sang high praise with V.E. Schwab, but I'm starting to wonder if she can truly write series or if she's better of writing standalones. I don't know. This is short because I don't have a lot to say. I'm just disappointed.

2/5 Stars

The Loose Ends List Review

The Loose Ends List is a novel about loss, death, and forgiveness. Maddie, the main character, finds out that her gram is dying and is taking them on a death-with-dignity cruise. Though at first she doesn't want to go for fear of seeing death, she ends up going and making friends with some of the other passengers on board along with getting a boyfriend. This novel was made out to be hilarious and heartbreaking, but was pretty brash and a little insensitive at times.

This was one of my most anticipated books this year and I could not be more appalled and disappointed by this book. The family that this book is surrounding is rich and uptight minus the gram. The main character was insensitive calling the stocky family onboard "Ornaments", the new guy on board "Gollum", and calling other people rather rude nicknames. I guess that was supposed to be funny but I personally found it shocking that an author would write a main character like this. She also had IBS, but it was put into this "hilarious" light on how she "ruined another thong due to her IBS" or something along those lines. I know that there are people who have this and it's not funny or fun to deal with. Gram was a pretty good character, a little out there, but she managed to be an okay character. The rest of the family was either drunk or out there and I don't have anything good to say about any of them. I was more attached to the secondary characters than the main ones.

There's some serious insta-love in this book. Maddie lays eyes on Enzo and claims that she's in love with him. He was a bad character all by himself but them together was cry-worthy. He pressured her to smoke weed (even though she said she would never do it), he got her to drink, and have sex. Her virginity was a long joke through the whole book which was completely unnecessary. It was brought up so many times and it was as if her family was pushing her to have sex. I have no idea what realistic family does that. She mourned the loss of her boyfriend leaving more than the loss of her gram. It was all just really backwards.

I must say though, I did like the idea of a cruise travel book. I haven't read any books where the main character travels by cruise so this was new for me. Each stop was beautifully described and I had a clear picture of every destination that they landed on. I think this was probably the only thing I liked about the book.

I'm surprised so many people liked it, but maybe they read the main character's tone different than I did. 1.5/5 Stars.

With Malice Review

With Malice is a thriller and a mystery that follows Jill, who is accused of murdering her best friend after she ends up surviving the fatal car accident. She doesn't remember anything that happened before, during, or partly after the accident. She now has to piece together what happened while trying to hold on to her innocence. Included in the book are interviews with family members and witnesses, text messages, and other little things that make you feel as if you're piecing together the crime also.

I typically do not read thrillers after being disappointed by We Were Liars. I figured they were all probably similar and I wasn't missing out on much with this particular genre. That being said, I still decided to pick this book up for some reason. The idea of Jill not having her memory and being blamed for this kind of intrigued me and I saw some hype surrounding this book when it first came out. This is an enjoyable story if you don't expect too much of a shocker at the end.

Jill was a good protagonist. I was cheering for her and hoping that she was innocent and that there was more than what met the eye with the accident. I wasn't expecting a happy ending with her story though she got one and that left me extremely disappointed. There was also a character growth with her towards her feelings toward Simone, and while they were understandable the end still left me shocked and a little upset. I didn't expect her to go so cold towards her, but then again Simone was never a real friend so justice was served in a way. None of the other characters were super involved with the story except Anna. She was a fantastic friend to Jill and was what Jill needed at the time instead of everyone coddling her and pretending her life wasn't changing forever.

Honestly, I'm quite disappointed with this book and as I said before than ending was pretty cold, but I was intrigued with this story the whole time and while I did guess that it was who it ended up being, I still guessed a few other people in the process.

3.5 stars/5 Stars

City of Lost Souls {The Mortal Instruments Book Five}

This is the fifth book in The Mortal Instruments series, so if you have not read City of Bones, City of Ashes, City of Glass, and City of Fallen Angels I suggest you go back and read those before you read this book.

Wow. This book was intense. There was so much going on in this book I can't even put it all into this review. This book wasn't one character heavy. I felt that there was just enough of each character narrating it. As you all should know Sebastian, Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern is his birth name, rose from the dead with the demon Lilith. Jace and Sebastian are now bound together and if one of them gets hurt the other gets hurt as well, if one of them dies they both do. Sebastian controls Jace's mind and what he does and when Jace is actually himself he has no recollection of what happened when he was being controlled. The Clave was searching for him nonstop but other things got more important and less Shadowhunters were ordered to search for him. Obviously Clary, Isabelle and Alec are infuriated with this decision and they decide to try and find Jace on their own. Of course they have Simon, Isabelle's love but she doesn't know it yet, Magnus, Alec's immortal boyfriend, Jordan and Maia. Jace and Sebastian come for Clary at Luke's house and let's just say people don't go unscathed. While no one is paying attention Clary sneaks out and waits for them to come back so she can join them to take them down from the inside out. Clary has a way to communicate with Simon but its a secret and I will not tell you because it's pretty cool. When Jocelyn finds out Clary left she's furious. Magnus, Alec, Simon, and Isabelle summon a Demon and an Angel. One of them helps them one of them doesn't do them any good. Eventually Clary gets her Jace back, somehow someway she does. That's all I will say about this intense book and I left out a chunk of it for a reason, its shocking what this person does. Thank you so much for reading!
Happy reading!

If I Was Your Girl Review

This book is about a transsexual teen named Amanda who has to deal with a relationship and friends and no one knowing who she truly is. This is an extremely important book for people to read because it shows the struggles of a trans teen in this brutal world. It's 2016 and we still aren't accepting of people who are different than us. We shouldn't care because it doesn't concern us and they aren't hurting anyone. They're being who they are and isn't that the most important thing? That being said, I didn't love this book. So I'm going to split this review into two parts: characters and plot. I have a lot to say about some of these characters.

Characters
1. Amanda (main character)- Amanda was a good main character, but not one that will stick out in my mind for years to come. She's extremely brave for the things she has to go through and she never had self-pity for any of the troubles life put her through. She was a little young sounding for almost being 18 but that's no big deal. A very average character.

2. Bree- I don't know what happened with her. She was introduced as the chill girl who Amanda found a friend in. I never saw any hints that she ever felt affection for her, but all the sudden at the homecoming dance she outs her? I didn't truly understand that. It also seemed extremely out of character for her.

3. Chloe, Layla, and Anna- I'm combining these three because they're rarely seen without the others. They were fantastic female friends and how friends should be. They didn't leave Amanda when Bree did what she did to her. In fact, I think they only got closer and this is how girls should be. Instead of shaming each other, create a tight bond that can last forever.

4. Grant- I hated him since he was first introduced. One minute he was hot and the next minute he was cold for what reasons? I felt he was also bossy and kind of rude towards Amanda. He was just a bland love interest.

Plot
I didn't see where there was a plot in this book at all. I thought this was going to be more about Amanda transitioning, and it was more of the aftermath with some flashbacks of when she started the medicine (I forgot the word. I'm so sorry). I think the only time anything really happened was at the end which seems to be happening for a lot of the books I've been reading lately. I just don't think this was the story I was expecting and that's nothing against the author.

2/5 Stars.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone {Harry Potter Series - Book One} Review

This review for J.K. Rowlings Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, is going to be a little different than the other reviews we have done. Since we read this book together we are going to review it together. Onto the reviews folks.

Elle's Review For This Novel

What happens in the book is described quite nicely in Redda's review so I'm not going to repeat what she said. I'm actually struggling with writing a review for this book because most of it has been said and done already, but let's do another review. As we all hopefully know, this book series is about a wizard named Harry Potter. This is also my first time ever reading it.

This could be because I'm going into the Potter game pretty late, but I thought that this wasn't anything new. It's just another chosen one story who has enemies and came from a less than desirable home who all the sudden becomes someone completely new. That's nothing new in any genre. This book in all honesty did not have a plot until the end. It was just about his adventures at wizarding school, and if you look closely you'll also see that the book didn't follow any specific plot until the end, as most books do this. That doesn't mean it was a bad book; I still quite enjoyed the shenanigans that the gang got into. I just lost a direction with the book.

The character's were your average stereotypical characters. Nothing new with them either. I loved Ron (yes more than Harry) and didn't like Neville or Malfoy (does anyone like Malfoy?). Hermoine was a typical know-it-all and Harry was a decent main character. Nothing that blew me out of the water.

Now, I know this review may be harsh as this book is directed more towards kids, but I look at books a little more critically than some people and I don't just like to give a book 5 stars because it's popular. Booktubers do enough of that. To conclude, I don't see what all the hype is with this series as it is just an average book series. but I think it's because it's what people grew up with and I'm not knocking that.

4/5 Stars.

Redda's Review For This Novel

When I was younger I attempted to read this book and I just could not get into it whatsoever. But today I am glad to say that I am so enthralled with this book, and series for that matter, I just couldn't wait to finish it. Reading with your best friend is the greatest thing/feeling with books like these because you get to discuss and fangirl over characters, together. Now, my favorite character of this book, was Rubeus Hagrid, better known as Hagrid. 

Harry Potter is a Wizard but he doesn't know that until Hagrid comes to tell him. But let's back up just a smidge. Harry lives with his aunt Petunia, uncle Vernon, and his cousin Dudley. Harry showed up on the Dursley's doorstep when he was an infant and it's a whirlwind from there. The Dursley's didn't want anything to do with Harry because Petunia and Vernon knew he was a Wizard because of his extremely powerful parents, Lily and James Potter, who died in a "car accident." Harry believes his parents died in a car accident, but that isn't the case whatsoever. He lived in a cupboard under their stairs almost all of his life that he lived there and had hand me down clothing from his, much larger than him, cousin. Other than his hand me down clothing, Harry has very few belongings.

On one very unusual day Harry gets a letter, he'd never gotten a letter before, so Mr. Dursley opens it and he doesn't like the contents of the letter and he never lets Harry see it. Letters keep coming and eventually, some time later, Hagrid shows up to tell Harry what's in the letter and that he's a Wizard. Also I love the way Hagrid is written and the way he speaks. He sounds like a pirate but a nice pirate that's really cool. Hagrid takes Harry to get everything he needs for school and such and it's a whole new world for Harry. He's famous. And at Hogwart's he befriends Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger. Ron and Hermione teach a lot of things to Harry about the Wizard world that he didn't and couldn't learn in the Muggle world, even though Hermione was raised in the Muggle world she is very well educated. Anyways, this is all of the book I will spoil for you, there is so much more to it! I hope you enjoy this series of double reviews! Happy reading! 

I Woke Up Dead at the Mall Review

I Woke Up Dead at the Mall is about Sarah, a 16 year-old girl, who wakes up dead at Mall of America with no recollection of who killed her or why. In fact, she deals with trying to believe if she was truly murdered or if she suffered from food poisoning.

This was a great novel that gave a more lighthearted look at death instead of grim reapers and deciding on whether you belong in Heaven or Hell. It's based in Mall of America, which I said above, and that type of setting was absolutely wonderful to see used as a death place. It only added to the lightheartedness of this novel. This book does hold a bit of mystery to it because there isn't a reason as to why the person killed Sarah for a good portion of the novel and you're just left with the question, "Why?" Granted, you will find out and it'll be sort of obvious as to who did it and why if you pick up the clues. It was a super predictable novel, but it was a fun one so I can't complain.

The main character Sarah was a fantastic narrator. She was witty (trying a bit too hard sometimes), funny, and actually cared about her family and the dead people around her. In all honesty, all the characters has such diverse personalities. It was absolutely refreshing to see. I think as a whole this novel did a fantastic job at being positive with relationships between characters and being relatively positive with the whole death scene. I would read another book by this author hands down.

4/5 stars.