Paper Butterflies | Half Lost | Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda | Lying About Last Summer

It's been a while since I did a mini reviews post but I'm lacking the motivation for longer reviews at the moment. I've still managed to avoid a reading slump (yay!) but my reviews have been building up so this is my solution! Sometimes it's nice to just read a lot and not worry about having a lot of things to say about it afterwards, you know?

I really enjoyed two of these books and the other too were just a bit meh. I'll start with a positive!

Paper Butterflies | Lisa Heathfield

This book was utterly heartbreaking but so captivating and I devoured it really quickly. It's one of those stories where the character is enduring something so awful but you can't tear yourself away from knowing what happens next. June's father remarried after her mother died and her stepmother has been abusing her ever since. She is truly evil but this isn't a fairy tale and her wickedness is truly vile. The abuse isn't easy to see from an outside perspective and a perfect example of not knowing what happens behind closed doors; behind the facade that people portray. We follow June as she grows up through her teens and makes a friend in the utterly wonderful Blister and his family (who is now one of my favourite fictional characters!) and we also have an "After" perspective from when June is older. Beautiful writing, heartbreaking, unpredictable and unforgettable. 

Half Lost | Sally Green

This was so disappointing. I have been a big fan of the Half Bad trilogy and had been really looking forward to the conclusion but it just lacked an exciting spark for me. The majority of the plot is Nathan looking for Analise with the intention of killing her. There isn't really a lot of other action so Nathan's inner monologue just becomes very boring and repetitive. There were no real twists or surprises (except for the ending which I'll come to) so it was hard to care about where the story was heading. As for the ending.. completely unbelievable. In the literal sense. I actually cannot understand why it ended this way (except for a shock value, I guess, a bit like Allegiant) but seriously.. *SPOILER*

Gabriel is killed off and Nathan decides to turn himself into a tree? A tree?! What. The. Hell.

If you haven't started this series then I would struggle to recommend it after this finale.

Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda | Becky Albertalli

I've been meaning to read this book forever and I wish I hadn't waited so long! It's the perfect cute and funny read to lift your spirits. I smiled pretty much the entire time that I was flying through the pages. Simon is a great character who has some pretty hilarious one-liners and I adored his relationship with Blue. I did figure out who Blue was pretty early on but it didn't make the story or the reveal any less enjoyable. There's always a risk for romances to be too cheesy but this one was sweet, heart-warming and had me rooting for their relationship to work out from the beginning. I would have happily followed this story for even longer.

Lying About Last Summer | Sue Wallman

There's nothing particularly bad about this story; I think it's mostly just a case of it's me not you. Skye is at a camp for teens who are grieving a lost one but soon starts to receive texts from her dead sister. I found the setting pretty interesting as we have all of these grieving teens in one place and it was a good way of exploring the different ways in which people deal with their grief. The mystery side of the plot is where it didn't work as well for me. The reveal of Skye's texter was a surprise (a positive) but there was an additional mysterious plot which I didn't find surprising. I saw it coming and the way it was executed felt a bit like one of this horror films where you just know what's going to happen. I would recommend for the portrayal of grief which was interestingly done.

Have you read any of these books? I'd love to know what you think!

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Review: The Star-Touched Queen by Roshani Chokshi

The Star-Touched Queen | Roshani Chokshi | Published April 26th, 2016
Rating:
Goodreads | Book Depository

I had a really hard time with this book. The glowing reviews persuaded me to carry on in the hope that it would eventually fall into place for me but it just fell so flat. I found the world to be confusing, the main character annoying and the romance lacking. The best thing about The Star-Touched Queen is a talking horse and sadly she isn't even in the story enough to really make a difference.

The writing is beautiful at times but I honestly had a difficult time following it. It feels like there is a tendency for over-description and a lot of the time I just wanted to have things told to me straight without the flowery prose. It was tedious and I had to fight the urge to skip segments.

The main character, Maya, really doesn't stand out for me in any way. She is shunned by everyone for having a dark horoscope and so her life is quite lonely. Her father then forces her into an arranged marriage and he expects her to take poison once the marriage is complete in the name of saving her kingdom. This is how the book starts and I thought, great, she'll have to come up with a feisty plan here to save herself. Instead, a random guy turns up, rescues her and she spends the rest of the book barely thinking for herself, being stupid and obsessing over her rescuer who, you guessed it, is the love of her life.

The romance was boring. It is a prime example of insta-love and I just didn't care for it. The plot was hard to follow to the point where I'm still not completely sure what was going on a lot of the time and most of the characters felt very one-dimensional. There are some interesting ideas and a couple of likeable minor characters but they weren't enough to salvage this story for me.

What are your favourite books based on mythology? I'd love some recommendations!

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Review: The DUFF by Kody Keplinger

Title: The DUFF
Author: Kody Keplinger
Publication Date: September, 2010
Rating:
Goodreads | Book Depository
I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley.

Beauty really does lie in the eye of the beholder...

Seventeen-year-old Bianca Piper is smart, cynical, loyal - and well aware that she's not the hot one in her group of friends. But when high-school jock and all round moron Wesley Rush tells her she's a DUFF - a Designated, Ugly Fat Friend - Bianca does not the see funny side. She may not be a beauty but she'd never stoop so low as to go anywhere near the likes of Wesley ... Or would she? Bianca is about to find out that attraction defies looks and that sometimes your sworn enemies can become your best friends ... With a wry and tell-it-like-it-is voice, The Duff is a witty and poignant story of a teenager struggling with the rules of high school attraction, along with the breaking down of her relationships with family and friends. It is a novel about what it means to be sexy, in a world where we feel we have to be perfect!

I must have spent the majority of this book rolling my eyes.

At the beginning of the book I thought I might be able to like Bianca. She is told by the attractive popular guy, Wesley, that he is talking to her because she is the DUFF (Designated Ugly Fat Friend) and it'll make him look good to her attractive friends. So what does she do? She throws her drink in his face like he deserves. It then all goes drastically downhill from there.

Bianca finds out that her parents are getting divorced so she starts sleeping with Wesley as a distraction. I just don't get it. She said earlier in the book that she thought her parents should divorce because her mother is never around but when it happens it's this big surprising and emotional event that apparently sends her over the edge. Not to mention the fact this guy has just called you fat and ugly and told you he was using you in order to have sex with your friends. Wow, what a catch.

I might have been able to tolerate her apparent self-destruction if she was at least likable but she was mean and obnoxious a lot of the time that I just couldn't like her at all. She is supposedly worried about the divorce being a catalyst for her father to start drinking again and when it becomes apparent that that is the case, she just ignores it. She is apparently worried and scared but she doesn't do anything. She just sleeps with Wesley some more. Her mother (who was a total bitch by the way before being forgiven in record time) calls to check up on things so you'd think Bianca would admit to what's happening and get some help from an adult, right? Nope. She lies and sleeps with Wesley some more.

What do you think happens next?
Bianca starts to realise she has feelings for Wesley and doesn't want to just use him for sex. Her longtime crush Toby splits up with his girlfriend and he and Bianca suddenly strike up a friendship which turns into dating. She thinks he's a much better choice than Wesley because he's charming but she repeatedly tells us that there are no sparks and now she's using Toby as a distraction from Wesley. She also ditches her friends and acts like a bitch towards her best friend Casey who is just worried about her but Bianca is embarrassed about Wesley so avoids her and then becomes annoyed when Casey decides she's not going to keep chasing her and practically begging her to talk. But it's Casey who's being the bitch, obviously. During this time, we find out that Wesley might not be the total prick that we think he is. *sigh*

I think you can probably guess how it ends. I will say that the second half is more enjoyable than the first but not by much. I think this is definitely a book you either love or hate. Bianca is probably the most annoying character I have ever read and I think that says it all.