Top 10 Tuesday: Books You've Read Because of a Recommendation

Top 10 Tuesday is a weekly meme that is brought to us by The Broke & the Bookish. Check out the topic list here.

When you're a part of the book community, it's not surprising that your tbr becomes something of a whale. After all, you love books, the people in the community love books, and what else do we love? Sharing those books with other so that can can fangirl, commiserate, laugh about, and in general just talk about the books that we loved, hated, emotionally sobbed over, etc.

This week's topic is all about the books I've read because of the people I've met in the book community. These aren't in any particular order, but I am trying to include who recommended them if I can remember because if you've successfully recommended a book to me once, odds are you've got good taste and I'll trust you again. ;) If there's no one person or two tagged, then the book was probably recommended by so many people that it would take a whole other post to thank them (*cough*Six of Crows*cough*).

1. The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

Recommended by: Cait @ PaperFury, Jon @mrquietone

2. The Rook by Dan O'Malley

Recommended by: Aria Mia @thelifegeek

3. The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

4. Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Saenz

5. Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare

6. Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard

7. The Winner's Curse by Marie Rutkowski

8. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

9. Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

10. One Man Guy by Michael Barakiva

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Review: Disney Manga Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas by Jun Asuka

Disney Manga Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas by Jun Asuka

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Manga publishing pioneer TOKYOPOP brings you a special edition gorgeous hardcover manga based on the classic Halloween masterpiece Disney Tim Burton s Nightmare Before Christmas. A must-have for manga fans, Tim Burton fans, and Halloween fans alike!! Collect this horrifying masterpiece!"

Rating: 2 Stars

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I have long been a fan of The Nightmare Before Christmas. I have seen the movie, read the book, heard the book read by Christopher Lee. I thought that a manga adaption could, at the very least, be interesting. It came at the perfect time too. One never knows if this should be a Halloween or a Christmas book and, as this version is set to be published November 8th, it comes in relatively close to both holidays.

Despite all that, I was sorely disappointed in it. This had none of the life that any of the previous adaptations had. There were a few portions of the book where the lyrics for the iconic songs were included to attempt to harness some of that energy, but they fell flat.

Some of the characters felt like watered down versions of themselves, Sally in particular. She may have secretly been in love with Jack in the original, which is evident to the viewer, but in the manga, she became ever more of a wishy washy love sick girl and that took away some of the strength that Sally always had within her.

The art was alright, but it wasn't spectacular work that could make up for weak writing. If it had been of a higher caliber, than I might have been able to forgive a lot of the other faults, but this was sadly not a book that was meant to be highly rated in my esteem.

If you're a fan of The Nightmare Before Christmas, I highly recommend sticking to the movie or Tim Burton's original picture book. Both are much more deserving of your viewing/reading time.







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The Alchemists of Loom Countdown

Her vengeance. His vision.

Ari lost everything she once loved when the Five Guilds’ resistance fell to the Dragon King. Now, she uses her unparalleled gift for clockwork machinery in tandem with notoriously unscrupulous morals to contribute to a thriving underground organ market. There isn’t a place on Loom that is secure from the engineer turned thief, and her magical talents are sold to the highest bidder as long as the job defies their Dragon oppressors.

Cvareh would do anything to see his sister usurp the Dragon King and sit on the throne. His family’s house has endured the shame of being the lowest rung in the Dragons’ society for far too long. The Alchemist Guild, down on Loom, may just hold the key to putting his kin in power, if Cvareh can get to them before the Dragon King’s assassins.

When Ari stumbles upon a wounded Cvareh, she sees an opportunity to slaughter an enemy and make a profit off his corpse. But the Dragon sees an opportunity to navigate Loom with the best person to get him where he wants to go.

He offers her the one thing Ari can’t refuse: A wish of her greatest desire, if she brings him to the Alchemists of Loom.

Some of you may have read Elise Kova's Air Awakens series (and if you haven't, you really really should!). Now, from Elise herself, comes a new series sure to be just as magical as her first: The Loom Saga, Book One: The Alchemists of Loom.

Our Dragon Queen has graciously given us the above countdown widget above to celebrate the coming weeks as we wait for the release of the first book in the series. Ari sounds like a fantastic character, certainly a bold one. I'm very interested to see where she goes on her journey, aren't you?

January can't come soon enough!

TAG: The Netflix and Books Tag

Wandering around the Internet one Sunday night I found this tag had been done by Kendra at Reads and Treats. I was binge watching Gilmore Girls on Netflix at the time, so I thought why not finally do this tag?

It was originally conceived by Christy at Novel Ink and Lauren at Bookmark Lit.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia: Unlikable Characters

This book had such a unlikable main character that I couldn't even finish it. She was foolish and careless and didn't have any respect for the people closest to her that were trying to protect her from making the same mistake twice.  There was a lot of eye rolling and hair tugging on my part.

Vampire Diaries: Your Ship Sank or Didn't Happen

Celaena Sardothien and Dorian Havilliard. There were a couple of choices for Celaena in this book and Dorian felt like the right one, but she rejected him because she wants to protect him from the king, which I get but it still stinks. This is only the first book in the series and there are at least five more books to go, so there's always the chance that things will work out, but for now that ship has a smoldering fire aboard and is slowly sinking into the dark, dark ocean.

Friends: Best Cast of Characters/Friendships

It all starts in The Shop on Blossom Street when the main cast of characters meet and start to become the best of friends. It's really the foundation of the whole series. You learn their backstories, their weaknesses early on, and then as more books come out you realize that while more characters might be introduced, they're there to become a part of this circle of friends rather than to separate them.

Gossip Girl: Hate That You Love or Guilty Pleasure

This series is definitely a guilty pleasure. I hadn't really thought of it that way until I thought about the fact that I find myself defending my reading of it when the subject comes up. It may not be my favorite series ever, but I do like it and I think I might even reread it soon.

Doctor Who: Long Series You Loved

This series is so long that I still haven't finished it. It has twenty-nine published volumes and a thirtieth that was meant to come out in 2008 but was postponed and then put on hold indefinitely after the author's death in 2011.

It's a mystery series about a journalist who solves crimes with a little help from a pair of Siamese cats, Koko and YumYum.

Grey’s Anatomy: All the Feels

The Raven Boys has a couple of those moments where no matter how bad you think you know the next page might be, your heart really isn't ready for it. You read it, expecting tears, but then they don't come, just the soul aching wrench as one or more of your favorite characters gets into a fix or a plot twist is revealed.

How I Met Your Mother: Bad Ending

I'm still sore about this book. Nothing freaking happened in the end. I mean, literally. Nothing of any importance, nothing that was alluded to either in the description or  throughout the narrative, FREAKING happened. It was like the plot got cut off with a hideous pair of shears and someone typed up a hurried conclusion.

Supernatural: Favorite Paranormal/Fantasy

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe was one of the earliest stories I ever remember hearing. It left such a profound impact on me that for years I would check closets, just in case, since I don't think I've ever been in a house with a proper wardrobe. To this day it makes me more than a little sad that I haven't found a doorway like Lucy did, leading to a land of adventure, even if that adventure did start out a bit dark at first.

Freaks & Geeks: Left You Wanting More

The story takes place over a couple of hours and I was left with a few questions or at least a few curiosities. I mean, the main character is in kind of a shitty situation with a girlfriend he's not really in love with pregnant with his kid; he's half in love with a soon to be former co-worker. I wish I could've found out for sure what happened to everyone after their last night.

The OC: Series That Should've Ended Earlier

I liked The Selection and gave it four stars, but The Elite was barely a three star read for me. I have a feeling that that book was completely unnecessary and this series is going on for much longer than it needs to. Why not just combine The Elite and The One? That would've made things much better, though I suppose it wouldn't have made quite as much money.

Girl Meets World: Should Have a Spin-off

I could really go for a spin-off book for this one, something about the origins of the Hempstock family. I know there are a few clues and whatnot in this book, but I want something more indepth that really gets into the hinted at mythos behind Lettie and her mother and grandmother.

That 70’s Show: Set in a Different Time Period

This was one of my favorite series when I was a teenager. It's about a sixteen year old girl, Annie, who idealizes what life was like in the 1800s. She finds out, one day, exactly what it's like when she accidentally slips through time and ends up in her hometown, only it isn't 1995 anymore: it's 1895. She copes decently well with this, considering her study of etiquette and fascination with how things were done, but there's still a lot of danger for a girl who is out of her own time. Both Sides of Time is the first book of in a series of four.

Orange is the New Black: Couldn’t Stop Reading

This had a lot of weirdness going on that brought up a lot of questions that I needed answered before I could put it down. I think I only did so a handful of times because the story just begs for you to finish it as soon as possible. There's a dakr and sinister edge to the quest of the main character that will leave you with an uneasy feeling until you know what fate awaits her.

Parks and Recreation: Made You Laugh Out Loud

Jim Butcher certainly has a way with words and Harry Dresden is the perfect mouth piece for his wit. This is the beginning of the Dresden Files and I often find myself quoting the book aloud, laughing as I do so, to my husband and refusing to share the book until I'm done.

One Tree Hill: Favorite Book Boyfriend

This one feels like a bit of an old fashioned choice, but Carl Brown from Joy in the Morning is an amazing man. He's dedicated to his profession, but would do anything for his girlfriend then wife Annie. He supports her in her dreams, even if they're not necessarily the norm for women of the day. Plus, he works himself to the bone to support his family, even when giving up would be so much easier. He's a good man, that Carl Brown.

Breaking Bad: Favorite Villain

I spent the second half of the book, after the big revelation that the Darkling was actually a bad guy, hoping and praying that he wasn't actually and that something would turn out to be a lie. Since that didn't happen, though, I'm now content to read the rest of the series with him as my favorite villain. He's charming and intelligent, like a Russian version of Loki of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Modern Family: Best Family or Parents

The Weasleys are the ultimate family. I have never read of a family that was more welcoming and accepting of someone that wasn't related to them. Molly Weasley does her best for her children and will help any of her children's friends out, no questions asked, just because they are important to her kids. That kind of acceptance is beautiful.







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Top 5 Wednesday: Books That Took You the Longest to Finish

Top 5 Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Thoughts on Tomes. Check out the Goodreads group here.

Some books just take longer to get through than others. Is it the writing that doesn't flow, the action that isn't fast paced enough? It depends on the book, really, and below are the five books that I think took me the longest to read along with how long it took me to read them.

5. P.S. I Still Love You by Jenny Han

Read time: 18 Days

This one might have had a lot to do with the fact that I disliked the narrator for the audiobook. Her voice wasn't appealing at all, but I was trying to read this while I was working so I ended up switching between the audiobook and the physical book.

4. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Read time: 26 days

This was an okay book for the first half, but the second half felt really slow to me. Things just weren't clear or they were dull, so that made me less interested in actually finishing the book. This is one of the few instances where I think the movie was better than the book.

3. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

Read time: 87 Days

Oh god, this book was just so terrible and reading it was felt tortuous, but I try so hard not to dnf books. That's the only reason I finished this. That, and it was before I had my revelation about there being too many books to worry about the ones that just weren't working out.

Nothing really happens in this book and I held out for hope that that would change for far too long. It was a one star read, through and through.

2. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

Read time: 114 days

I'm not sure why this one took so long. Maybe it was the pictures that threw me off, the writing was a it slow? I honestly don't know. I liked it well enough in the end, but yeah, it took me a little over three months to get there.

1. All Fall Down by Jennifer Weiner

Read time: 139 days

This one, I'll be honest, was not entirely the book's fault. I was reading it at work and thus was only about to read it about a chapter at a time. When you can only read a book a chapter at a time three days a week (if you're lucky) then it's going to take some time. This is, I think, the longest it's ever taken me to actually read a book I was (semi) serious about reading, so it takes the number one slot today.

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Top 10 Tuesday: Top 10 Favorite Villains

Top 10 Tuesday is a weekly meme that is brought to us by The Broke & the Bookish. Check out the topic list here.

This week is so much fun. October seems like the perfect time of year to talk about villains. Maybe it's because it's Halloween season. The temps are dropping, the atmosphere is getting just right to watch my favorite horror movies or, in this case, read books with my favorite villains.

A funny thing I've been noticing with literature and television lately is that the villains aren't just people we hate anymore. We're being made to feel sorry for them, we're falling in love with them, and isn't that just a weird thing? The best example I think of is Rumplestiltskin from Once Upon a Time. Rumple is technically a villain, he's done horrible things, but because of the way the writers are handling him, I've grown to love him as a character and I want only the best for him and Belle. What are writers doing to our morals?! *lol*

Here, then, this week is a list of my 10 ten favorite villains:

10. The Trunchbull, Matilda

The Trunchbull is, if anything, all of the horrible things that you can think a teacher might be rolled into one and then enlarged until it becomes so huge that it takes on a life of its own. The Trunchbull is a frightening beast and is the perfect counterpoint to the beloved character of Matilda, the sweet and highly intelligent five year old that bests her using her brains.

9. Gestalt, The Rook

I'm not sure they're considered the villain of this piece, but they're certainly one of them. Gestalt is insanly creepy and that's only the half of it. You have to read this book to fully understand the oddness and full-on creepiness that is Gestalt, a hive mind sort of creature in four bodies. And  that, too, is just the start.

8. IT, A Wrinkle in Time

A villain that wants everyone to be the same? It's like children of the corn that got mixed with a children's novel. It's one of the worst things I can think of, everyone being exactly the same, forced to be the same, reprogrammed if they stray even a little. When Charles Wallace starts to succumb to this villain, the story really gets heart breaking. This is one of my favorite villains because it is one of the most terrifying and, truth be told, one of the most realistic.

7. Ursula Monkton, The Ocean at the End of the Lane

If ever you thought a nanny was a good idea, Ursula Monkton will surely give you pause. She's wicked in the most base sense of the word. She looks like a regular person, but it's the aura she has the makes you feel like something is wrong. That's what puts you off, but you can't tell why. The unsettling feeling, the perfect mask shading old evil, makes Ursula one of the "best" villains I've read of.

6. The Other Mother, Coraline 

The Other Mother is an interesting character. In the movie, Coraline takes a lot longer to see her for what she is, even with the frightening button eyes. In the book, it's almost instinctive. The Other Mother tries to pretend like she's the ideal mother figure, but she can't hide her villainous nature. Her attempts to do so, however, make her quite interesting, both on the page and on film.

5. Count Olaf, The Series of Unfortunate Events

Count Olaf is a terrible person, no doubt, and he's a villain in the sense that's he's greedy, murderous, and cruel. He's out to get the Baudelaire fortune by any means necessary. However, when it comes to tangling with the three Baudelaire orphans, he's just so spectacularly bad at it that I think he's almost more comical than he is terrible.

4. Jadis/The White Witch, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Jadis is an iconic villain for me. I remember reading this book and then seeing the animated cartoon, so that was the image in my head for years until the live action adaptation in 2005 (somehow I missed the BBC version). She is terrifying from the start, even when she's trying to act nice. She's fearsome and has the power to turn people to stone in an instant. Who wouldn't be afraid of her? Edmund, apparently, but he's a silly git for the the first half of the book. -_-

3. Dolores Umbridge, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Now this isn't to say I like Umbridge. She's a god awful person and the worst character in the entire series. Yes, even worse than freaking Lord Voldemort. That being sad, she's my favorite villain of the series because she's so good at being just that, a villain. The scariest part of her is that she doesn't look like what you think of as a villain. She isn't big or intimidating. She doesn't have huge scars marring her face or crazy hair like another psycho witch I might mention. If we're going by looks alone, she could be a sweet old lady and that's the front she presents to the world until you cross her. That's when the scariness really comes out and the worst of it is, this is the type of villain that is all to real. You're unlikely to come across Voldemort in the real world, but an Umbridge substitute? Totally believable.

2. The Darkling, Shadow and Bone

I've only read Shadow and Bone of the Grisha trilogy so far, so my opinion of the Darkling is based solely on what you can read about him in that volume. I think my adoration of this character comes from the fact that for most of the book, he's actually portrayed as a good guy, as a love interest for that matter. When things started going south and his mother revealed his true colors, I was still hoping that maybe she was lying. Maybe there was an ulterior motive? By the end I was heartbroken to discover that he was just as evil as people claimed him to be, but I still had to admire his abilities and his dedication to maintaining that trustworthy facade. He certainly had me fooled.

1. The Ring/Sauron, The Lord of the Rings

I've been working my way through this book for awhile now and I'm not sure whether you'd count the Ring as it's own separate villain or whether it's considered a real part of Sauron. Personally, I'd say once it's on it's own and trying to get back to its master, then it's an entity unto itself. It is that entity that I find to be the most frightening villain of all because of what it does to its victims.

It amps up paranoia, greed, and other instincts in its host that turn them into vicious and pitiful versions of themselves. What I wonder at times, though, is whether it actually does anything to them, or whether it just removes whatever it is that stops a person from giving into these temptations and lets them turn themselves into their own worst villains. I'm not sure which is more terrifying, but The Ring as a villain, or Sauron if you view it as an extension of him, is the one that is both frightening and fascinating to me.

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Review: The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

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Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue never sees them--until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks to her.

His name is Gansey, a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.

But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can't entirely explain. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul whose emotions range from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher who notices many things but says very little.

For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She doesn't believe in true love, and never thought this would be a problem. But as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she's not so sure anymore.

Rating: 4 Stars

I'm glad that all of the books in this series have been published by the time I got around to reading them. If I had to wait a year or more after the cliffhanger I just read, I might well have gone out of my mind.

This book doesn't have a lot of action in it, exactly, so a lot of the drive in the novel comes from the characters and they're fairly distinct. I liked Blue, the non-psychic in a family of psychics, and the thing I liked best was that she wasn't bitter about not having the same powers as her mother or aunts. Sure she wished she had something more interesting that being a human energy booster, but in another novel she might well have devolved into a whiny brat that would've ruined the book.

Gansey, the main male lead of the book, was an interesting boy. He has weird ideas about money and the world, which we're able to get a realistic look at through Adam's eyes, but his family is a tad weird. I get that they're rich and all, but they really don't care that he's been running around the world looking for a lost king? Seems a bit off to me, but maybe it'll come up in a forthcoming book?

Ronan got a rough intro here and I think I'll find out a lot more about him in the next book, The Dream Thieves, which seems to be a lot more about his background and about certain things that were revealed about him in this book. He has a lot of rough edges that, while they came in handy at certain points, were again a bit ragged.

Adam had a rough deal. We got a lot of answers as to his backstory, which were just sad, and then the ending made things quite murky for him. I feel like he was the character that I could look up to the most. He wanted to be able to change his situation on his own terms, doing whatever it took, even if that meant working three jobs and getting next to no sleep so that he could study and be the top study at Aglionby Academy (how do you pronounce that, by the way?).

Noah...oh boy, Noah. If Adam was the character that I could look up to the most, then Noah was the one I empathized for the most. There was a lot of stuff going on in his corner that could at best be described as tragic and, while he's still around going into The Dream Thieves, I can't help but wonder how well things will end up before the series is finished. Nothing good lasts forever.

As for the plot...

I felt like there was a lot that was alluded to in the summary that might have gotten resolved on the surface, but you can sense that it wasn't really resolved. There's a whole multifaceted craziness going on that left me feeling a bit on edge because I could tell that something was still going on and I didn't know what it was. Hopefully I'll find out soon and, like I said before, luckily I can sooner rather than later because all three remaining books have been published! :D

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