October Wrap-Up

Hello people, we’re here today for my monthly wrap-up. Yep. Another month gone. This whole year is going by way too fast… either way, let’s get on with this wrap-up.

In my October TBR I proposed myself to read 10 books this month, and in fact I was able to read 11. However, I only read 6 from my original TBR list… UUUPPPPSSSS! I managed to read a lot while traveling, but I decided to tackle my Netgalley TBR list, leaving some not so urgent books to read at a later time. So, the books I read this month:

1. Cinder by Marissa Meyer  

2. Rikki by Abigail Strom  

3. The New Year’s Wish by Dani-Lyn Alexander  

4. A Summer Like No Other by Elodie Nowodazkij  

5. Always Second Best by Elodie Nowodazkij  

6. This Song Is (Not) for You by Laura Nowlin  

7. The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone  

8. Your Voice Is All I Hear by Leah Scheier  

9. Frosh: First Blush by Mónica B. Wagner  

10. The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak by Brian Katcher  

11. Angelfall by Susan Ee  

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Eleven books was great 😀 , especially considering that I was traveling for half the month. And I’m super happy because even traveling, I managed to write 60 posts this month, which means almost 2 per day… and I wrote reviews for all of my books, even if some are still not up.

Tomorrow I’ll post my November TBR 😀 .

The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak (Brian Katcher)

The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak is Stonewall Book Award-winning author Brian Katcher’s hilarious he said/she said romance about two teens recovering from heartbreak and discovering themselves on an out-of-this-world accidental first date.

It all begins when Ana Watson’s little brother, Clayton, secretly ditches the quiz bowl semifinals to go to the Washingcon sci-fi convention on what should have been a normal, résumé-building school trip.

If slacker Zak Duquette hadn’t talked up the geek fan fest so much, maybe Clayton wouldn’t have broken nearly every school rule or jeopardized Ana’s last shot at freedom from her uptight parents.

Now, teaming up with Duquette is the only way for Ana to chase down Clayton in the sea of orcs, zombies, bikini-clad princesses, Trekkies, and Smurfs. After all, one does not simply walk into Washingcon.

But in spite of Zak’s devil-may-care attitude, he has his own reasons for being as lost as Ana-and Ana may have more in common with him than she thinks. Ana and Zak certainly don’t expect the long crazy night, which begins as a nerdfighter manhunt, to transform into so much more…

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People, this book is FANTASTIC! I was excited for it, and it took a long time for me to get my hands on it, but it was worth it, because I loved it.

The writing is awesome, funny, easy, and honestly, just go pick up the book, you’ll like it.

I really liked the characters. At first I wasn’t seeing eye to eye with Ana, because she’s a bit of a stuck up, but then she grew on me. I immediately loved Zak and Clayton though, and their interactions were hilarious. I also really liked how the relationship between Ana and Zak evolved, because the poor guy was into her from the first moment we see him, but she took a while to get there, mostly because she took a long time seeing him for anything other than a slack, but so many things happen to them, that she didn’t have much choice 😀 .

That’s another great thing of this book, it’s a 24h-plot kind of thing, so there isn’t one single dull moment, there is action all the time, and the most unpredictable things happen to these guys, lol.

I know that I finished this book with a huge smile on my face and a disturbing feeling that I should attend a con. Heck, I was reading while having lunch at the cafeteria at the university and 2 random girls came to ask me what book I was reading because I was laughing so much… they even took a picture of the book!!!

Go read it people, NOW! It’s super fun, super smart, with a lot (and I mean a LOT) of geeky references, and it has the cutest romance. 😀 GO READ IT!

Rating: 4.5 Stars

3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge (5): Day 3

Hello! Jesalin @Life : books, the arts, and nature was kind enough to tag me for the 3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge, so here we go people, for the 5th time!

The Rules:

1. Thank the person who nominated you.
2. Post a quote for 3 consecutive days (1 quote for each day).
3. Nominate three new bloggers each day. (this is my 5th time doing this, so I nominate whoever wants to do it, ok?)

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Welcome back for day 3! On the first day I gave you a quote from Eleanor & Park, and on the second day it was from My Heart and Other Black Holes. Today I’ll give you a quote by none other than the brilliant J.K. Rowling, from her book (and Harvard commencement speech) Very Good Lives: The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination.

October Book Haul

Guys, I did super well this month! I only bought 2 books, and that was way back in the very beginning of this month. And then I held my own and didn’t get anything else. Ok, honesty time, it wasn’t for lack of trying… I was running around Seoul and Japan desperately trying to find one book in English (that I didn’t already have) and I failed… I found some in South Korea, but the price just wasn’t worth it. When I got back I tried to find Carry On on my local bookshop, but no dice, so I didn’t bought anything else.

In terms of physical copies, I got:

• The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak by Brian Katcher

• Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon.

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Then I didn’t buy any ebooks, again, not for lack of trying, but Amazon was going crazy with me because my country on Amazon is Portugal, and I was either in Spain or in the middle of Asia during this month, and it wasn’t letting me buy books at the portuguese price – just so you know, they are more expensive if I change the country to Spain and I don’t get it!

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I did request and got approved for a bunch of Netgalley eARCs… I went on a request spree, because I spent most of my month reading ARCs, as you’ll see tomorrow on my wrap-up post. So, here they are:

Crystallum (Primordial Principles #1) by Laney McMann

Frosh: First Blush (Frosh #1) by Mónica B. Wagner

Always Second Best (Broken Dreams #2) by Elodie Nowodazkij

Right Where You Are by L.E. Bross

Something in the Air by Marie Landry

Grounded By You (A Willoughby Inn Love Story #2) by Ivy Sinclair

Did I Mention I Love You? (The DIMILY Trilogy #1) by Estelle Maskame

Nirvana (Nirvana Series #1) by J.R. Stewart

Like Candy (Candy #1) by Debra Doxer

The Last One (The One Trilogy #1) by Tawdra Kandle

Ok… I was really into romances and New Adult books this past month, they’re exactly right for the time in between huge and more heavy fantasy series. That it is, 12 book, 10 of each eARCs… 😀

Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda is coming to the big screen

*OMG OMG OMG I’M TOTALLY FREAKING OUT HERE*

Deadline announced a bit ago that FOX 2000 has acquired the rights to the Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda novel, by Becky Albertalli. People, Simon is going to become a movie!!! Who’s excited about this? (Besides me, obviously!)

I love this book so much, it’s one of my favorites of this year, and I think it could be an amazing movie, and I can’t wait to see Simon and Blue on the big screen 😀 .

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“EXCLUSIVE: Fox 2000 has acquired a package for an adaptation of a popular YA novel that’s described as John Hughes-style coming-of-age, coming-out story. The studio bought Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda, a debut novel by Becky Albertelli that will be produced by Wyck Godfrey, Marty Bowen and Isaac Klausner (The Fault In Our Stars) of Temple Hill, and Pouya Shahbazian (Divergent) of New Leaf. The script will be written by Isaac Aptaker & Elizabeth Berger, who planned to pitch studios all over town, only to see Elizabeth Gabler’s division quickly take it off the table, preemptively. 

The novel focuses on Simon Spier, a 16-year-old not-so-openly gay student. When an email written by Simon falls into the wrong hands, his secret is at risk of being made public. Change-averse Simon is forced to find a way to step out of his comfort zone before he’s pushed out — in a way that won’t alienate his friends, compromise himself or ruin a shot at happiness with the most confusing, adorable guy he hasn’t even met yet.

Fox 2000’s Erin Simonoff and Molly Saffron moved quickly to acquire the book, and New Leaf’s Chris McEwen will be associate producer. HarperCollins published the novel this year and it is set to roll out in 19 countries.“

3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge (5): Day 2

Hello! Jesalin @Life : books, the arts, and nature was kind enough to tag me for the 3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge, so here we go people, for the 5th time!

The Rules:

1. Thank the person who nominated you.
2. Post a quote for 3 consecutive days (1 quote for each day).
3. Nominate three new bloggers each day. (this is my 5th time doing this, so I nominate whoever wants to do it, ok?)

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Day 1 I did an Eleanor & Park quote, today I’m going for another favorite of mine that I read this year, My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga. I loved this book. Depression and suicide are serious topics and we should all read more about it. And coincidently, this was also my book for today’s Book Traveling Thursday.

Marvel’s Jessica Jones: posters

I love the posters (and animated posters) for Marvel’s Jessica Jones. Have you seen them yet? I love them so so much 😀 😀 😀

Book Traveling Thursdays: A Book that Scared Me

Hello, welcome back to another Book Traveling Thursdays, which a weekly meme created by Cátia @The Girl Who Read Too Much and Danielle @Danielle’s Book Blog. The goal is to share the covers of a book related to that week’s theme, which you can see at the Goodreads group, indicating the original cover, the one of your country, your favorite and least favorite.

This week’s theme is “Halloween is only 2 days away! Choose a book that scared you“. I’m going to go with a different kind of scary, because I don’t read scary books. So, my scary will be of the emotional kind, and for that, nothing more perfect than My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga.

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Original COver:

I love this cover so so much. I love the colours and the design, and I wish I owned the hardcover, because that one feels amazing. I do own this version in paperback, which is cool enough I guess.

COVER FROM MY COUNTRY (PORTUGAL) & COVER FROM THE COUNTRY I LIVE IN (SPAIN):

Unfortunately this book is still not out in Portugal, but it is in Spain. I’m not a fan of this cover, although it is definitely not the worst one.

Favorite COVER(s):

                                   

I’ve already mention how much I love the original cover, But I really like this new e-book american edition as well… so I’ll share the love.

LEAST FAVORITE COVER(s):

    

These covers are pretty bad. First comes the Danish, which is just ugly! Then (obviously) the Russian, and I say obviously because I’ve been featuring Russian covers in this section for a while now. This cover is ugly, although it does kind of speaks to the story… And then the Italian cover, which would have been nice if this wasn’t a story about depression and teen suicide.

3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge (5): Day 1

Hello! Jesalin @Life : books, the arts, and nature was kind enough to tag me for the 3 Days, 3 Quotes Challenge, so here we go people, for the 5th time!

The Rules:

1. Thank the person who nominated you.
2. Post a quote for 3 consecutive days (1 quote for each day).
3. Nominate three new bloggers each day. (this is my 5th time doing this, so I nominate whoever wants to do it, ok?)

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I’ll start this round with a quote from Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell, an amazing book that you’ve probably read, right? No? What are you waiting for?

The Disney Book Tag

Hello fellow bloggers. I was nominated to do The Disney Book Tag by the wonderful Summer @XingSings (thank you so so much!) – I’m not even going to tell you to go follow her, because unless you’ve been book blogging for an hour, you’re bound to have found her already and clicked that “follow” button, am I right? I love Disney, so I’m sure gonna love doing this tag.

1. The Little Mermaid – A character that is out of their element, a “Fish out of Water”.

OMG, I just finished this book, so I’m gonna rave a bit about it: Ana from The Improbable Theory of Ana & Zak (Brian Katcher). – If you haven’t read this book, go pick it up right now! It’s fun and hilarious 😀 . So, poor Ana is literally a fish out of water when she is thrown into a comic book/sci-fi convention, with the King of said con, in the hopes of finding her little brother. A lot happens!!! 😀

2. Cinderella – A character that goes through a major transformation.

Juliette from the Shatter Me trilogy (Tahereh Mafi) comes to mind. She’s so lost and scared in the beginning of the first book and then by the third she’s totally comfortable in her own skin.

(Juliette fan art source)

3. Snow White – A book with an eclectic cast of characters.

I’m going to go with something totally different for this answer… the cast of An Infinite Number of Parallel Universes by Randy Ribay is super diverse and surprising.

I was super pleasantly surprised by the amount of diversity in this book 🙂 .

4. Sleeping Beauty – A book that put you to sleep.

Ok, it’s not really that this book put me to sleep, it’s more that it was so boring for some parts that I wanted to put it down… A Whole New World: A Twisted Tale by Liz Braswell… =/

5. The Lion King – A character that had something traumatic happen to them in their childhood.

Cinder from Cinder (Marissa Meyer) had something VERY traumatic happen to her in her childhood, so much so that she doesn’t even remember it.

(Cinder fan art source)

6. Beauty and the Beast – A beast of a book (a big book) that you were intimidated by, but found the story to be beautiful.

I was so intimidated by An Ember in the Ashes (Sabaa Tahir) when I got it, I don’t even know why, the book is not even 500 pages, but I have the hardcover edition and that book is huge compared to most of my paperbacks.

7. Aladdin – A character that GETS their wish granted, for better or for worse.

Maggie from The One Thing (Marci Lyn Curtis). All she wants is to see again, and she manages that, even if it’s for the worst possible reason…

8. Mulan – A character that pretends to be something or someone they are not.

I think everyone answers this, but here it goes… Mare from Red Queen (Victoria Aveyard). But to give an alternate answer, I’m going with Dahlia Moss, from The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone 😀 .

9. Toy Story – A book with characters you wish would come to life.

I’m gonna go for the obvious one here and say Queen of Shadows (Sarah J. Maas), because I would really like if Rowan, Aelin, Aedion, Dorian, Lysandra, etc, were real. I’m fairly certain that Aelin would not let me live for too long, because I would be unabashedly staring at her Fae Prince and her half-fae cousin.

10. Disney Descendants – Your favourite villain or morally ambiguous character.

Ok, I’m gonna drop a highly hated character here… I hate him too, I really do, but I honestly feel like he’s a great character and I think he’s more morally ambiguous than most characters that I could have said – because he never gets to turn around or anything like that. He’s BAD! Arobynn Hamel!

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And it’s done! Have you done this tag? No? Do you want to? Consider yourself tagged! 😉