Top 5 Wednesday: Fictional Cities!

Hi everyone! Back for another Top 5 Wednesday. This weeks topic is fictional cities!

If you're interested in joining in on all the fun, here is a link to the Goodreads group created by gingerreadslainey on Youtube: www.goodreads.com/group/show/118368-top-5-wednesday

1. Jannuari - Snow like Ashes

Although you only get brief scenes of within the city, from just that I can image what a magical place it is with the constant winter weather and snow covering the buildings. My favourite season is Winter, so theres no surprise that that appeals to me more than the other seasonal cities in this book!

2. Lunar - The Lunar Chronicles 

I haven't read Fairest yet as I'm saving it closer to the release date of Winter, but the art in the book was absolutely stunning, and if thats what the city on Lunar looks like, boy I want to go there (And avoid Queen Levana obviously...). 

3. Terravin - The Kiss of Deception 

Not at all a city, but the atmosphere and homeliness in this seaside village was so lovely. I'd like to think its similar to somewhere I will live in the future. It sounds so picturesque and makes you forget about all the bad things in life, just like Lia managed too while she was there. 

4. Atlantis - The Little Mermaid 

Fictional/Non fictional? Who knows, people would argue either way. But this city's depiction in almost all works, from films to books, always feels magical and a bit mysterious. The little girl inside of me wants to go and explore the depths of the ocean to find this place. (Avoiding the sharks..)

5. The Emerald City - The Wizard of Oz 

Who could forget the wonderful wizards beautiful green city? I've fantasised about what it would be like to walk around this place since childhood! My Wicked obsession only fuelled this further haha! 

Top 5 Wednesday: Book series you wish had more books!

Hi bookworms! Here's another Top 5 Wednesday - this weeks topic is 'Book series you wish had more books!' This has been by far the quickest I've ever come up with my answers for a topic.

If you're interested in joining in on all the fun, here is a link to the Goodreads group created by gingerreadslainey on Youtube: www.goodreads.com/group/show/118368-top-5-wednesday

So here are my top 5 books/series (That are as far as we know are finished) that I wish had more books! :)

1. Graceling/Fire/Bitterblue by Kristen Cashore
One of my first and favourite fantasy series of all time - these companion books just aren't enough, I need more of this world please! It's so interesting with the graced abilities and the authors writing so fast paced that I couldn't put it down. Graceling will always stay as one of my favourite books.

2. Under the Never Sky trilogy by Veronica Rossi
I loved the end to this trilogy, but WHAT! That can't be the end! There is so much more to tell about this world and I'm sure Aria, Perry, Roar and the others will surely find some more trouble to get themselves into. I loved this trilogy, the characters making this book in my eyes as I grew so attached to them. The world and storyline is nothing I'll forget soon either and was unique. A trilogy I thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend to all.

3. Glass Arrow by Kristen Simmons
Whyyyyyyyyyy is this book a standalone! Its killing me. I really, really enjoyed it and flew through it in a few hours. Although I love and am impressed by standalone fantasy novels, I was really intrigued by the world and wanted to know more. Doesn't have to be the same characters but please Kristen a companion novel? I'm sure others will feel the same way as I do.

4. Avry of Kazan trilogy by Maria V Synder
*Grabby hands* I need this so badly. I was so upset when this trilogy ended and its still my favourite out of all Maria's books. It was enthralling and just fuelled my love for fantasy books even further. There was the perfect mixture of, action, romance, politics and magic which all mushed together to keep me reading for hours. This has just made me want to reread these books. As if I didn't have enough on my to-be-read pile (*cough* shelves). Any one who is a little bit scared to dive into fantasy, this is a perfect trilogy to start out with.

5. Harry Potter series by J K Rowling 
Duh! Don't need to say much else, I think the whole world is dying for this to happen.

So, what do you say authors? Ready to write some more books?

My Reading History

My Reading History

I thought that it would be fun to see how things have changed throughout the years in terms of how much I’ve read and what type of books I've read! I’m going to go into a fair bit of detail here but the initial idea came from the Bookish Beginnings tag on Youtube, which was created by Lauren from Reads and Daydreams. 

Since being read to as a child I’ve always had a fascination for books. The first books I actually remember collecting and getting excited about were the Beatrix Potter books, starting off with The Tale of Peter Rabbit.
These were short books which focused on a different character story each time and I think the illustrations helped develop the link with descriptive words and a visual picture. I adore these books and will always remember them to be the spark that started off my own independent reading as a child.

From here on, it just snowballed with reading. I was lucky enough at the time to live right round the corner from my local little library, which held all sorts of activities and challenges for children to encourage reading. Of course, I wanted to participate in all of them and became well known to the staff for my book devouring! During this stage I particularly remember getting really into Chris D'lacey's series; The Last Dragon Chronicles and then really into Cornelia Funke books, my favourites being The Dragon Rider (Maybe I had an obsession with dragons?) and the Inkspell trilogy.

Just after this was when my Harry Potter obsession began, after being read a chapter every day in English class in primary school. Although I got sucked into the story, I was got frustrated that we had to read the story so slowly and when other children disrupted the teacher. Sooooo, I went home and asked my parents if we could buy the books that were out!
Over the next couple years I read a lot, ranging from The Spooks Apprentice series by Joseph Delaney, Eragon by Christopher Paolini to the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz - this is the point where I really began reading more teenage fiction and when I read Twilight before the world went crazy! Reading this sparked my liking for paranormal and romance books and from there I delved into series like Hush Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, The Secret Circle by L.J Smith and The Darkest Powers series by Kelly Armstrong.
The next phase of books I remember being particularly wrapped up in are the Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare and The Divergent books, along with the Vampire Academy series. This was the first  time I became really keyed into release dates and using online to discover new books to read. At this point I had a part time job that I could use a little of to buy books, although my parents made sure I didn't buy too many and became more wary of my reading and book collecting habits. I remember going into Waterstones one time on my lunch break to buy Insurgent on its release day, only to release once I was home that that particular batch of books had been misprinted! I was so angry haha!

After a mini Dystopian obsession, I was struck ill suddenly and was off school for months, which is where I really relied on books to keep my brain active and to stop myself missing my friends. They provided another world to escape to when my own life wasn't going
that great! This is when I finally delved into what is still my favourite genre to this day - Fantasy! Graceling, Fire and Bitterblue by Kristen Cashore quickly became favourites (and still are) and I began to read authors such as Maria V Synder, Trudi Caravan, Sarah J Maas and Robin LaFevers.
Soon enough my health improved and I moved on to start university, moving away from home. I read and bought books from my Kindle since they were cheaper and my reading habits slowed down as I was bogged down with work to do. However more free time came as I became ill again at the end of my first year of university, meaning I had to move back home and finish my studies there. At this point when I did read I went through an Adult Urban Fantasy phase such as Kelly Armstrong's books. My health improved again, but this meant back to university I went for my final two years, where not much reading happened due to the work load and socialising. I still kept up to date though with upcoming releases of series I hadn't finished yet!

Within a week of finishing university I had already got a really good job back home, which did keep my free time minimal but also allowed me to have the spare money to purchase... you guessed it, BOOKS!
I really got back into reading once again and exhausted my small local bookshops. So moved to the internet, where over the next year I began discovering books on amazon and from people from booktube. I was quick on discovering books that hadn't been released yet and got used to the agonising wait for release day.  Its also the time I started my bookstagram and discovered that so many people loved books as much I did and everyone had such differing opinions and preferences to what they particularly enjoyed reading. I mainly did stick with fantasy books, but recommendations from people saw me delving into some contemporary books which previously I stayed clear of, such as Collen Hoovers books. During this period my favourite reads were The Mime Order, Falling Kingdoms, The Kiss of Deception, Snow like Ashes, The Lunar Chronicles and the Angelfall trilogy.

So, after all that, I now have a book haul at least once and month and an overwhelming tar pile - thank you Amazon, people of book tube and goodreads hahaha! As you can see, my love for books since my childhood has just swelled and I wouldn't have it any other way, as I, as many others do, get so much enjoyment from what others would just think as boring words on a page. Little do they know what an adventure they are missing out on.

Hope you're all doing well, I'd love to hear some of your own reading histories, long or short!
Happy Reading xox

Top 5 Wednesday: Least favourite character tropes

Hi everyone, I'm back for another Top 5 Wednesday! This weeks topic is top 5 least favourite character tropes so lets head on into that.

If anyone's interested to start Top 5 Wednesday and join in on all the fun, here is the link to the goodreads group created by gingerreadslainey on Youtube: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/118368-top-5-wednesday

1. Insta-love


Why? Why does this happen? 99% of relationships do not work like this. You can't just meet someone and within the week be completely head-over-heels-I'll-sacrifice-myself-for-you in love. You're just attracted to them, its okay, calm it, give it time and it will then become something much more special. We don't need a repeat of Romeo and Juliet, please.

2. Love triangles




I used to looooove love triangles when I was a teenager. Maybe for me as I've grown up it's just become a thing that doesn't happen in reality, or its classed as disrespectful/cheating (if you've made a commitment with one). So I don't feel like its anything I want to be reading about as it confuses and upsets me when characters bat around worrying about who they actually want to be with.




3. Overprotective main protagonist 




Whether this be to a certain individual or a need to save everyone, this annoys me either way as a lot of the times this happens the character doesn't value their own safety and become a hypocrite by throwing themselves into any dangerous situation blindly. It's like they think they have some special main character 'I'm invincible gene'.




4. Goody Two-shoes



As much as I love a good protagonist, I'm getting a little sick of characters trying to do everything they can to fix stuff. I personally find villains in movies and other books to be quite amusing if they're given a dry sense of humour. I'm not meaning that they have to be the most sadistic person in the world, but if someone had superpowers in a book it would be nice to see them have a little selfish fun with it. Might make for an interesting book with a swap around of characters motives!





5. Female perspectives 

This might just be luck of the draw with the books that I've read and nothing to do with anything else, but I find that 80% of the books I read have the main character as female. It may have just happened this way over the years as I pick up books with characters that I think I will relate to, but I'm hoping that in the future this will even out as some of the books I have read with dual perspectives with a main male point of view I've really enjoyed. I need more leading males!

Book Review: The Heart of Betrayal by Mary E Pearson

I don't think I've said any outright spoilers, but don't read this if you haven't read the first book (The Kiss of Deception) as I don't want to upset or spoil it for anyone with my half review/half discussion. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED :D

Review:

It's taken me a while to compile my feelings on this book and I didn't want to just come on here and splurge out all my thoughts immediately after reading.
This book, like the first, was a roller coaster ride of feelings and I never really could guess what was going to happen, which I really enjoyed. For me, the book continued from the excitement of where the first left off before dying down slightly in the middle before ending with a bang- and I mean a massive bang! I sat up on my knees and couldn't read fast enough! Although I really loved it, there was just that little bit of spark missing which I felt throughout the first book. It came back right at the end and I realised how much I did really love where the series was going but I was a little disappointed with the middle section of the book. I did like the new environment that Lia and Raffe were in as it was like balancing on a knifes edge and kept me tense, but I also became a little disconnected with the characters at this stage as I never really knew what any of them wanted (apart from Raffe I guess). You really saw the intellectual strength of the characters shine through at this point, where the political manipulation and their cunningness was what was keeping them alive at this stage of the book.

 I was a constant supporter of a particular 'ship' throughout the first book and continued that feeling through the second. But. And here's the but. I HATE LOVE TRIANGLES. And unfortunately that was the aspect that confused me completely. No matter how well they are done, they always seem to annoy me in books. Maybe because it makes me conflicted? I'm not sure. Lia makes it fairly obvious who she truly loves but I still got slightly confused with her caring nature towards the other character.  This might just be in Lia's personality though, as even though she has been brought up hating the Vendans, even when she is a prisoner within their city she sympathises with their struggles and starts to embrace their culture and make friends. Either this or she was being manipulative (towards Kaden) to stay alive (understandable). But to be honest, he's revealed to not be all what he seems also, with some background information about him given.

The underlying religious/spiritual/magical/prophecy/wehavenoideawhatitisyet was developed further in little teaser snippets here and there, with sections of religious texts spotted throughout the book, which started to come together and make some sense. Although we're far from understanding it completely, it made me even more intrigued about whats going to happen in the future. One thing about Mary E Pearson's writing is that it really keeps me page turning - I always finished her books much quicker than I thought I would, so they have obviously kept me captivated enough! When I first read this book I thought that I would rate it 4 stars - but looking back at all the development that was done and how just enough was revealed to keep you enticed I've raised this to a 4.5 stars and I'm super excited for the next book. I think when I reread the book I will have a little more appreciation of the smaller less action packed sections of the book and will see the bigger role that they play in the series as a whole.

All in all I thoroughly recommend this series! If you've been thinking about the first book for a while,  stop hanging about and do it and try not to let the hype sway your experience, because they really are great :)
Happy Reading!

Top 5 Wednesday: Favourite book maps!

Hello everyone! 

I'm super excited about Top 5 Wednesday this week, as a lot of you know my favourite genre to read is fantasy. As fantasy books are set in a different world, this means a lot of books within this genre have maps to help readers better visualise the new world that is being described to them. So this was not only a ton of fun to find my favourites but absolutely heartbreaking to cut it down to a top 5!

As always, Top 5 Wednesday is a goodreads group created by gingerreadslainey on youtube, if you'd like to join in, here is the link to the goodreads group: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/118368-top-5-wednesday

Lets get started!

TOP 5 FAVOURITE BOOK MAPS!

1. Primoria from Snow like Ashes

This map just brings me right back to certain scenes in the book, I love it so much. It seems to me to be completely unique, in terms of shape and the whole concept of having the seasons as countries. Although not really do-able, I think this map would look stunning in colour, to show off the different climates of each region. 

2. The Kiss of Deception 

It's unknown if this world has been given a collective name, but each region is named. I love the detail that's put into this map - the illustrations around the lower half and the colour really make me feel like this map is from a really ancient text and goes along with some of the religious themes within the book. The cities shown aren't just distinguished by having their borders drawn and name inside - the infrastructure of each place and its style of building is shown. Another thing I also like is the preplanning in the map, with places marked up regardless of whether the character will visit them in the first book or a future book. 

3. Erilea from Throne of Glass

Although it seems to be much more simplistic than other maps, this one covers a much larger area. You get the feeling of how much the characters have had to travel from place to place. I really like the names of the places labelled, with even the smallest of areas noted for when a character mentions a time before when they had visited, no matter how short of a snippet that is. Although its fairly preplanned, I still feel like this map has room to grow as the story develops. 

4. The Seven Kingdoms from Graceling

I really like this map. I'm not sure if its just the style of it but it gives me a lord of the rings vibe. For only a short fantasy book with only companion novels this map is really good! The detail in the bordering and typography adds so much to this map and I love that each of the kingdoms shield emblems are shown, even if they are simple. The zoom in of the area where the characters spend a lot of time traveling gives you a little bit more detail from just the overview of the kingdoms and I love the drawings of the castles and boats. A small but sweet map!

5. Mytica from Gathering Darkness

This map is present from the beginning of the series, but is one that is developing as the story goes. Gathering Darkness is the most up to date, with places labelled. Its pretty much a squashed version of the UK, with a few small areas chopped here and there. The swirl design used to signify the sea is a nice little addition in the background but as this is such a long series, I do wish there was a little bit more detail to the map. This is only the third book out of six so I guess plenty of time for it to be added to and developed further. 

Honorable mentions - These books are still on my tbr and so I felt as much as I loved the maps, I couldn't add them to my Top 5 as I feel that the story makes the map come to life. 

- An Ember in the Ashes

All I need to say is that this map is stunning! Across two pages and the detail across the whole thing is great, from the mountains and tree to the different city buildings. It looks as if there is room to develop if there is another book and it makes me very excited to start. 

- Winterspell

This map seems to be completely different and feels like its a modern twist to a fantasy world. It makes me very intrigued! Plus the castle in the centre makes me think of the disney castle!

- The Orphan Queen 

This map looks like there is a ton of room to add to it and like its gonna be a pretty big world.

That's it for this weeks Top 5 Wednesday - make sure to comment what you think of my choices or leave a link to your own favourites!
HAPPY READING!

Top 5 Wednesday:Favourite Character Tropes!

 Hey everyone, here's the last Top 5 Wednesday for July: Favourite Character Tropes!

These are some things which are overused in YA books, but I can't help but love sometimes.
As always here is the goodreads group created by Gingerreadslainey on Youtube: http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/118368-top-5-wednesday

1. Bad character turns good for the girl. 
I'm a sucker for seemly bad tough guys and even more when they turn out to care so much for another character. I just love that one person can change the way they act or think just because they care so much for them. N'aww <3

2. Troubled/traumatic childhood
 I hate that this happens so often. But on the good side, out of the books I've read the majority of the backstories have been different from one another. The outcome is nearly always the same for the character personality. Someone who is a little bad ass and independent, which a chip on their shoulder. They always seem to crack at some point though at holding their emotions together.

3. Disappearing love interest in the second book of a series/trilogy. 
WHY DO THEY DO THIS. Well, I know why. It gets us all riled up waiting for them to be together again and it keeps people turning the page till they're back. Its so frustrating, but it keeps me reading! I've found this to happen so many times in books.
The Kiss of Betrayal by Mary E Pearson - The Prince can rarely see or have a proper conversation with Lia due to circumstances.
World After by Susan Ee - Raffe also disappears off several times throughout the book.
Through the Ever Night by Veronica Rossi - Aria goes off on her own journey and Perry stays with his tribe.
Scent of Magic by Maria V Synder - Kerrick is absent for the majority of the book, only returning within the last 20 pages.
Magic Study by Maria V Synder - Valek and Yelena are in separate countries apart from a few short moments.
The Winners Crime by Marie Rutkoski - Arin and Kestrel are also in separate countries and only have a few stolen moments together. Even then Kestrel does not admit her true feelings towards Arin.
Shadows by Isla J Bick - Tom and Alex are separated and don't know where each other are throughout the book.
Never Fade by Alexandra Bracken -  Ruby is separated from Liam during her time with the Childrens League.

4. 'Secret' royalty 
This happens a lot in books I've read recently. Either someone doesn't know they are of royal blood and its revealed or royalty is in disguise and the main character doesn't know. Some books that have this include, Snow like Ashes, Red Queen, Throne of Glass, Cinder and The Kiss of Deception.

5. Bad-ass main female characters
As much as I love bad-ass characters who are independent and look after themselves, it happens in so many books now that its not unique. Other characters in the book always comment on how amazing it is that they are different etc as well.  They always end up running off and doing things on their own agenda before thinking about safety. But I much prefer the over use of this character personality than having a whiny and needy character that would probably annoy me throughout the book :D I won't list any since that would probably mean typing up half my bookshelf.

Let me know what you guys think about these character tropes!