Top Ten Tuesday : Book Wishlist

HAPPY HOLIDAYS, EVERYONE!!!

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic was books you want to see under your Christmas Tree. Since I don’t celebrate Christmas, I’ll just go with the alternate of Book Wishlist.

I’ll talk about the books I would love to get as gifts. Here we go!

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BRIBES ( Books I’d probably already have read by now if I’d gotten them as gifts)

 

The Great Alone
This book made a failure out of me because it has been in my tbr list for half the year almost now, and I still haven’t read it. SMH.

 

 

 

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

I’ve only heard amazing stuff about this book! Besides, the premise is so interesting and I know I’ll be mindblown when I read it. And I really want to read it!

 

Circe

I don’t get to read much mythological fictions considering my love for them. I’ve been hearing great things about Circe that makes me want to read it!

 

 

The Children of Blood and Bone

At this point, I feel like I might be the only one who hasn’t read this book. I’m disappointed in myself.

 

 

The Hate U Give

The guilt is very high for me still not having read this book yet. But the thing with me is the more time passes with me not having picked a book, the lower it goes down my TBR pile.

 

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HOARD ( Books I have read but would still want more of)

 

Muse Of Nightmares

I own the E-book. But this was one of my best reads of the year. So, I want to own a hardcover version of this book. But I’m too broke at the moment to be able to afford this. Meh.

 

 

Six of Crows

I know I already own this book. But guys, have you seen this collector’s edition cover? How could I not wish to own the hardback of this version? HOW?!

 

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COMING SOON (Upcoming releases I’d like as gifts)

 

The Wicket King

This releases at the beginning of January and I’ve already seen so many lucky people get the ARC. Argh! I’m so freaking jealous of you guys!

 

 

A Place Without You

I only need the see the name Jewel E. Ann and that’s it. It’s an instant yes from me. This book releases on January 1. Perfect way to start the year. Am I right?

 

The Kiss Thief

I haven’t read an Arranged Marriage trope in a long time. I am intrigued by the blurb too. Gimme already!

 

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THE VERSATILE BLOGGER AWARD

Yaay! I got nominated for this amazing award by the even more amazing Tales of A Bookworm. Thank you so much! Also, I’m so glad to see you post more regularly these days! ❤

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RULES

–  If you are nominated, you have been awarded the Versatile Blogger Award.

–  Thank the person who gave you the award.

–  Include a link to their blog.

–  Select 15 blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly.

–  Nominate those 15 bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award.

–  If you are nominated, you have been awarded the Versatile Blogger Award.

–  Thank the person who gave you the award.

–  Include a link to their blog.

–  Select 15 blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly.

–  Nominate those 15 bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award.

–  Finally, tell the person who nominated you 7 things about yourself.

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I Nominate :

Meowread

Bibliophagistreviews

Daisygal

TBRandBeyond

Meltotheany

Lindseyreads

BookishlyRebecca

Facingthestory

Fictionnochaser

A kernel of nonsense

A lovely book affair

Chrissireads

Literarylion

ksahitya

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Seven Things About Me :

• I am a fool who decided to do an internship and work on my master’s thesis at the same time.
• I have an older brother who’s perhaps the reason I started reading books. Go him!
• I’m the only one in my family who wears glasses at such a young age and my mom likes to blame it on my habit of staying up late and reading books.
• My biggest weakness is perhaps chocolates.
• I have a thing for Kpop.
• I think that there is a disconnect between my mouth and my brain.
• My mother is my best friend in the whole wide world.

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I’ll be surprised if you haven’t fallen asleep by now! Hehe! Happy reading, you all!

TAG : 3 Days, 3 Quotes #2 – Day 3

Final day of the 3 day, 3 quotes tag. Thanks again to Facingthestory  for tagging me! I’ve really enjoyed doing this again. 😀

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Rules:

• Thank the person who nominated you.
• Post one quote per day for three days.
• Nominate three blogs per day to take part in this challenge.

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I’ll end this challenge with my one of my absolute favorite contemporaries of all time. I could never compliment Melina Marchetta enough!

 

Melina Marchetta, (On the Jellicoe Road) :

“It’s funny how you can forget everything except people loving you. Maybe that’s why humans find it so hard getting over love affairs. It’s not the pain they’re getting over, it’s the love.” 

 

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I’ll nominate :

Brianna the bookworm

Lili’s Blissful Pages

Howling Libraries

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ARC Review : CHATEAU BY THE RIVER

A faded photograph will lead one young woman to a ruined French castle where she will discover the truth of her own identity . . . and the enduring mystery of love.

Traveling to France on business, Alexandra Dawson has decided to seize the opportunity to explore a mysterious piece of her own heritage—a half-burnt picture of a woman who looks eerily like her, taken more than a hundred years ago in a local castle. In the charming rural village of Chandeniers, she discovers something else too—the gruff, ruggedly good-looking heir of the crumbled chateau.

Eric Lagnel is completely uninterested in Alex’s queries, until he realizes that she may have stumbled on a way to save the building. Their unlikely partnership is a surprise. But as Alex slowly unravels the secrets of her great-great-grandmother’s photograph—and the true history of the chateau—she begins to understand that no one is ever prepared for the ways love can heal old wounds and open the hardest hearts.

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This is a dual romance set in France. The story jumps between past and present with entirely different stories. The past features Gabrielle, great grandmother of Alex, the protagonist of the present story-line. We even have Alex reading Gabrielle’s diary entries at the present time in line with the events as we see them happen in the past time.

I liked the past story-line slightly more than the present one. The point of contention for me was that Alex has a fiance who happens to me a good guy. Although, her and Eric’s relationship start off on a frosty note, they slowly warm up to each other and we still don’t see Alex telling him about her fiance, even as both of them start growing feelings for each other. I can’t describe the frustration I felt for her. The direction their story took ended up being predictable no matter how hard I wished the author to thwart my expectations.

Gabrielle and Thomas were a midge more enjoyable to read. But honestly, both the romances didn’t click with me. The writing felt corny to me, for lack of a batter word. I did like the conversations between both the couples as they get to know each other. I also loved the literary references. But this novel just failed to engage me.

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My Rating: ★★★☆☆

Publication Date: 25th December, 2018.
Source: ARC from Publisher (via Netgalley)

Links –  Amazon| Goodreads | Barnes & Noble

TAG : 3 Days, 3 Quotes #2 – Day 2

Day 2 of the 3 day, 3 quotes tag. Thanks again to Facingthestory  for tagging me!

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Rules:

• Thank the person who nominated you.
• Post one quote per day for three days.
• Nominate three blogs per day to take part in this challenge.

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I just recently found this quote in an ARC of a book I was reading. It stayed with me.

 

Tim Applegate (Flamingo Lane) :

“You can’t go home. Because home is still home. But you aren’t you.”

 

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I’ll nominate :

Meowread

iloveheartlandx

Sahi

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ARC Review : FLAMINGO LANE

Chance is a hitman with hippie roots and deep emotional wounds, disillusioned by life and stung by love—and his next target is the woman who rejected him. As he closes in on his victim, Chance struggles to rediscover the competitive edge that normally makes him so deadly. Meanwhile, the one safe haven Faye Lindstrom can rely on will only last until the end of the summer, assuming that the violence in her past doesn’t catch up to her first.

For lovers of Southern noir, Flamingo Lane is a gritty cat-and-mouse pursuit that ventures even further into the haunted territories of revenge and redemption first chronicled in Fever Tree.

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Faye Lindstorm was kept as a sex slave by a man she fell in love with in Mexico. He turned out to be a overlord. She somehow managed to escape him but can’t escape her changed self. She decides to move to Florida to house-sit for a friend Dieter who is also an author in midst of writing a book of his own – Flamingo Lane – after his previous successful Fever Tree.

Unknown to Faye, an old acquaintance from Mexico – Chance has been assigned to kill her by none other than the Mexican overlord. Chance also happens to be someone who had an unrequited love for Faye back in their hippie days. But she had rejected him as she only ever saw him as a friend. Then there’s Dave, Dieter’s detective friend who gives Faye hope of starting over. However, Chance has followed her here too.

The characterization was spot-on. Chance, although a killer, was dealing with his own emotional scars that appealed to me. I found myself feeling sorry for him. I also rooted for Faye. She’s a mixture of vulnerable and strong that I always find welcoming in female characters. Dave, Dieter, Maggie and all the characters had interesting shades and made the read even more engaging.

The setting of the book made for a great Southern noir. I loved the environment that the author created. However, I keep making the same mistakes in that I didn’t know before starting it that this was the second book in a series. I’d have enjoyed it more if I’d read that one first. Also, that ending was quite predictable. But Flamingo Lane still wins for its narration and characterization.

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My Rating: ★★★★☆

Publication Date: 12th February, 2019.
Source: ARC from Publisher (via Netgalley)

Links – Goodreads | Target| QBD

TAG : 3 Days, 3 Quotes #2 – Day 1

I was tagged by Facingthestory for another round of 3 Days, 3 Quotes. Thank you for tagging me! I always love sharing my favorite quotes. This makes me unreasonably happy!

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Rules:

• Thank the person who nominated you.
• Post one quote per day for three days.
• Nominate three blogs per day to take part in this challenge.

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I’m going to post something by one of my favorite poets and short-story writers. He was a wizard of words.

 

 

Rabindranath Tagore:

“Let your life lightly dance on the edges of 
Time like dew on the tip of a leaf.” 

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I’ll nominate :

Sara @ Bibliophagist

B For Bookslut

Tales of a Bookworm

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BOOK REVIEW : My Favorite Half-Night Stand

Millie Morris has always been one of the guys. A UC Santa Barbara professor, she’s a female-serial-killer expert who’s quick with a deflection joke and terrible at getting personal. And she, just like her four best guy friends and fellow professors, is perma-single.

So when a routine university function turns into a black tie gala, Mille and her circle make a pact that they’ll join an online dating service to find plus-ones for the event. There’s only one hitch: after making the pact, Millie and one of the guys, Reid Campbell, secretly spend the sexiest half-night of their lives together, but mutually decide the friendship would be better off strictly platonic.

But online dating isn’t for the faint of heart. While the guys are inundated with quality matches and potential dates, Millie’s first profile attempt garners nothing but dick pics and creepers. Enter “Catherine”—Millie’s fictional profile persona, in whose make-believe shoes she can be more vulnerable than she’s ever been in person. Soon “Catherine” and Reid strike up a digital pen-pal-ship…but Millie can’t resist temptation in real life, either. Soon, Millie will have to face her worst fear—intimacy—or risk losing her best friend, forever.

Perfect for fans of Roxanne and She’s the Man, Christina Lauren’s latest romantic comedy is full of mistaken identities, hijinks, and a classic love story with a modern twist. Funny and fresh, you’ll want to swipe right on My Favorite Half-Night Stand.

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After being absolutely spellbound by her previous release (I still can’t get over Josh and Hazel’s adorableness), I was expecting to be wowed by Christina Lauren’s new release yet again. She’s such a favorite of mine that the expectations are always automatically heightened. But I was let down this time.

There’s a lot to love about My Favorite Half-Night Stand. I loved the friendship of the main group. All the characters had their own quirks. The banter and ribbing between the friends was fun and I could connect with their friendship. I also loved the texts between Millie and Reid. There was depth to it and I could feel the compatibility between them.

But Millie? I had MANY issues with her character. I get why she is the way she is. I also could empathize with her inability to open up. But I just could not understand the motivations behind her actions. She came off as whimsical and not at all in a relatable or adorable way. She totally played with Reid’s emotions. I found her to be emotionally immature but in a way that did not warrant any sympathy from me. I kept shaking my head in disbelief at some of the things she did and just so randomly.

Friends-to-lovers is my favorite trope but it failed to please me this time. Although, I loved the texts between Reid and Millie, I was not 100% convinced by their attraction towards each other. At one point, I wanted to see more of the friends than these two. I think that says a lot when the supporting characters interest you a lot more than the protagonists.

Although, I’m disappointed by the book, I am pleased with the world that the author created and want to see more of the characters. I’m looking forward to seeing the rest of the guys get their own stories. Fingers crossed that they live up to my expectations!

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My Rating: ★★★☆☆

Links – Amazon | Goodreads | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble

TAG : Tropes Book Tag

I was tagged by the my favorite Sara @ Bibliophagist for this!

It’s funny that I was excited when I got tagged in the post, but then I’ve been slacking off so much this past month that I forgot about it and had to actually go back and search for this tag! Yeah, I gotta catch up fast. And I’ll start with this amazing tag! 😀

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HOPELESSLY DEVOTED | NAME TWO CHARACTERS FROM SEPARTE SERIES THAT YOU SHIP

Shipping characters from the same series is hard enough without adding the difficulty of them belonging to different series! So, no. I’ve never shipped characters from different series.

DAMSEL IN DISTRESS | NAME A FEMALE MC WHO DIDN’T NEED A MAN TO COMPLETE HER

Lisbeth Salander.

 

LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT | NAME YOUR OTP

Rhett Buttler and Scarlett O’ Hara. Gone With The Wind.

MENTAL ILLNESS AS A QUIRK | NAME A BOOK THAT REPRESENTED MENTAL ILLNESS WELL

Perks Of Being A Wallflower, maybe?

THE CHOSEN ONE | NAME A MAIN CHARACTER THAT DID (OR ALMOST DID) RUIN A SERIES FOR YOU

Unpopular Opinion – Feyre got on my nerves more often than not during The Court of Wings And Ruin. I would have enjoyed the book a lot more with a little less of her self-righteous attitude.

 

FRIENDS TO LOVERS | NAME A DUO THAT WENT FROM FRIENDSHIP GOALS TO RELATIONSHIP GOALS

Definitely, Josh and Hazel.

AMNESIA | NAME A BOOK YOU WOULD FORGET FOR ONE REASON OR ANOTHER

Harry Potter. So that I could read the whole series for the first time again. Heh!

BAD BOYS | NAME YOUR FAVORITE VILLAIN

To hate or love?

My favorite villain to hate is Dolores Umbridge.

My favorite villain to love is Victor Vale.

MISSING PARENTS OR ADULTS | NAME A BOOK THAT COULD’VE BENEFITED FROM A BIT OF PARENTAL GUIDANCE OR ADULT SUPERVISION

Umm… I know there are books I’ve read which could use some of parental guidance. But I can’t for the life of me think of any of them right now. Meh.

GIRL/GUY GANG | TAG SOME FRIENDS

DaisyGal | Rebecca | Melany

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This was as fun as it was difficult! Of course, if you don’t feel like doing it, then that’s fine! But if I didn’t tag you and you still want to do it, please don’t let that stop you! ❤ 

             

 

 

Book Review : HATE NOTES

It all started with a mysterious blue note sewn into a wedding dress.

Something blue.

I’d gone to sell my own unworn bridal gown at a vintage clothing store. That’s when I found another bride’s “something old.”

Stitched into the lining of a fabulously feathered design was the loveliest message I’d ever read: Thank you for making all of my dreams come true.

The name embossed on the blue stationery: Reed Eastwood, obviously the most romantic man who ever lived. I also discovered he’s the most gorgeous. If only my true-love fantasies had stopped there. Because I’ve since found out something else about Mr. Starry-Eyed.

He’s arrogant, cynical, and demanding. I should know. Thanks to a twist of fate, he’s my new boss. But that’s not going to stop me from discovering the story behind his last love letter. A love letter that did not result in a happily ever after.

But that story is nothing compared to the one unfolding between us. It’s getting hotter, sweeter, and more surprising than anything I could have imagined.

Something new.

But I have no idea how this one is going to end…

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I have mixed feelings about this book.

I loved Charlotte and Reed together. They had a great chemistry and even greater banter.

What I didn’t love was how they met. That was just too overdone for my taste and I had a hard time believing the situations. I mean, I can buy that she drunkenly applied to see one of his real estates just out of curiosity. But you’re telling me that an extremely rich and busy guy like Reed would decide to indulge her, even knowing that she doesn’t have the means to buy the house and she was planning to waste his time. All because he wanted to catch her in her lies? Okaaay….

Then after Charlotte gets offended even though she’s the one who lied in the first place, she decides to tell her sob story to a random woman at the washroom. And that woman happens to be Reed’s grandmother who decides to hire Charlotte as an assistant? I’m sorry but that doesn’t fly with me.

I had a very difficult time getting into the story after Charlotte gets hired. Thankfully, I was really bored and decided to continue despite my reservations. I eventually got invested into the story when the main conflict was revealed. Reed’s secret gave the story a new dimension that excited me.

I was disappointed by the execution, though. Now, nothing makes me giddy like a little jealousy to fire the main characters up. But I’ve lost count of how many times we see Reed throw a jealous outburst and then go back to thinking he isn’t good enough for her until the next time he gets jealous. That kind of became a little too repetitive for me.

I wasn’t a fan of Charlotte. I started off liking her. But her actions and decisions, as we proceed with the story, started wearing off on me. I liked Reed but his indecisive and passive-aggressive attitude also got old too quickly.

There were parts of the story that I really enjoyed. I laughed out loud at many parts, and in others, I rolled my eyes. The tension between the characters was amazingly written.

I feel that the authors got carried away and overused some plot devices that took away from the story. And that’s a pity because this would be a 5-star read for me just with a few alterations here and there.

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My Rating: ★★★☆☆

Links – Amazon | Goodreads | Barnes & Noble