Help Audiobook Listeners!

Audible is having an AMAZING sale right now where you can buy an audiobook for, in many cases, less than one of their credits would cost. 

So I’m going crazy and trying to buy as many as possible. Does anyone have any good audiobook recommendations?

The Liebster Blog Award

I was tagged by the wonderful Yousra from Bookshelves-Infinity for the Liebster Blog Award! Thank you so much!

Directions:

1. Thank you Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog and link back to the blogger who presented the award to you.

2. Answer the 11 questions from the nominator and create 11 questions for your nominees.

3. Present the Liebster Blog Award to 11 blogs of 200 followers or less 
(Though I always feel bad about tagging people, so I’m going to leave this open to everyone - answer questions!)

4. Copy and paste the Blog Award onto your blog

The awesome questions Yousra designed are:

1. Who is your favorite author?
   I would have to say my favorites are Jane Austen, Marian Keyes, and Margaret Mitchell.
2. What is your favorite classic of all time?
   Either Gone with the Wind or Pride and Prejudice. I have to re-read Gone with the Wind to be sure, though. Maybe that’ll be the next book I pick up.
3. Will you read practically anywhere?
   Actually, no, I get extreme motion sickness when I try to read in a moving vehicle, so unfortunately, my reading is limited to when I’m stationary (though I do like listening to audiobooks when I’m driving – does that count?).
4. Approximately how many books are currently on your bookshelf?
   I would say between 150-250. I’m not about to count them all, but I’ve got 2 bookshelves, a crate next to my bed, books in boxes in the basement, stuffed in drawers in my closet, a small bookshelf in my closet, and about 4 stacks in another corner of my room, so… I have a lot.
5. Do you prefer ebooks or physical books?
   Lately I’ve been more into eBooks because I can more easily tote them around and have gotten a lot of awesome new titles on my Kindle. 
6. Have you ever dreamed of one of the books you’ve read?
   I know I have, because I’m a very active dreamer, but I cannot think of a good example right now.
7. What book has made you cry the most? 
   Gone with the Wind: I was depressed for almost a month after reading it.
8. Do you prefer first person or third?
   I was about to say first, but some of my favorite books are definitely third person. I don’t know. As long as the book is good, I don’t care what person it’s written in!
9. Do you read everyday?
   Yes, usually during all my breaks at work and before bed, and I also listen to audiobooks in the car, as well. Recently, though, I have gotten into a bit of a book rut and haven’t been able to stick with anything for long. For the past week, I’ve been simultaneously reading The House at Riverton, Area 51, City of Ashes, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, The Passionate Witch, and How I Write. I’ve just finished City of Ashes, and hopefully the others will be finished up soon, too, so I can get some more reviews on here!
10. Name the first YA novel that pops into your mind.
    Harry Potter. 
11. Have you ever made fan art for a favorite book? If so, which books?
    So this isn’t exactly fan art, but when I was in the 8^th grade, I had to do a project for my English class where I decided to do a pop-up book about the major parts of The Hound of the Baskervilles. I actually still have it because I’m a loser who holds onto things like that.

My questions:
1. What was the best “beach read” you read last summer?
2. List 3 happy memories associated with your favorite book.
3. What’s your favorite used bookstore? 
4. What is the longest book you ever read and how long did it take you to finish it?
5. What genre do you refuse to read?
6. What book to you consider to have the prettiest cover?
7. What’s the last book you gifted to someone else? Loaned to someone else? Borrowed from someone else?
8. What book makes you laugh out loud the most?
9. What book are you most looking forward to being released in 2013?
10. Where do you get most of your books?

I’m not tagging anyone because I feel like other people don’t enjoy these as much as I do, but if you feel like answering some book-related questions, feel free to do so! You can say I nominated you. I’ll back you up! 

City of Ashes

by Cassandra Clare

Genre: Young Adult
Rating: 5/5
Released: 25Mar2008
Pages: 453
Reminds Me Of: The TV Show “Supernatural”

This is book two of Cassandra Clare’s Moral Instruments series. Please do not continue reading if you have not read City of Bones, as this post will contain spoilers.

Clary Fray has recently learned that she is a Shadowhunter, her love interest, Jace, is really her brother, and her dead father is actually very much alive and just happens to be the evil Valentine, the man who is summoning evil demons to do his bidding. With her mother in a coma and Valentine on the lose with the Mortal Cup, Clary’s work as a Shadowhunter is far from over.

 In City of Ashes, Clary’s problems escalate. A series of mysterious Downworlder murders has the community on edge, her new romantic relationship with Simon is awkward at best, and her chemistry with Jace seems to be intensifying. Jace, meanwhile, is going through problems of his own, with the Lightwood family casting him out of their lives after finding out he is Valentine’s son and the fearsome Inquisitor showing up to punish him for his father’s crimes.

City of Ashes sees the Shadowhunters confront death, visit the faeries, battle Valentine, and form some pretty tight bonds with the Downworlders as well as the High Warlock of Brooklyn, Magnus Bane. Action-packed with just as much multi-dimensionality as the first book in the series, City of Ashes was a solid follow-up to City of Bones. There were a few plot twists that I thought were a bit over-done and had me questioning whether or not the remainder of the books in the series would be as good, but altogether, I was quite pleased and ready to start on City of Glass at its conclusion.

Clare kept my interest up with intriguing hints about Clary and Jace’s heritage as well as with an exciting cast of secondary characters, including Magnus (who, let’s be honest, is kind of a rock star). Altogether, I would enthusiastically recommend this to lovers of fantasy books and young adult fiction.

Spoilers.

Clare had me hooked when characters started mentioning possible experiments Valentine had carried out on his children and when the faerie queen asked Jace whose blood ran through his veins. The mysterious last words of the Inquisitor (which are not actually revealed to us – yet) and the half-finished confession Valentine lets loose regarding his first-born child (who, apparently, is not Jace) really had my mind swirling. Could it be possible that Jace and Clary are not actually siblings?

In City of Ashes, Simon dies a lot. First he gets turned into a vampire to save his life, and after Valentine slits his throat, Jace saves Simon by giving him his own blood which turns Simon into some strange hybrid who craves the taste of blood but can walk in the sunlight. The third time Clare tried killing him off in the book, though, I had had enough of this same plot twist and was begging her to kill him off once and for all. I mean, I liked the guy, but enough is enough. However, it seems as though Simon is going to die another day and concluded the book alive. Toward the end of the book, Simon and Clary break up, which was a relief because quite frankly I was getting tired of the two of them fighting about their relationship all the time.

Also, it is revealed that Jace and Clary have somehow gotten special Shadowhunter powers, with Clary being able to draw powerful, never-before-seen runes and Jace being able to will his body to accomplish physically impossible feats such as jumping 30 feet high and scaling buildings.

Other things that happened that are important but not necessarily worth paragraphs of their own: the Silent Brothers have been killed off by Valentine, who has also stolen the Soul-Sword, giving him power to summon all the demons he wants, Maia the werewolf and Simon kind of have a thing going on, Alec almost comes clean about his relationship with Magnus to his parents, Luke confesses to Clary that he’s in love with her mother but never had the guts to tell her, and in the end, Jace tells Clary that he is cool with just being siblings with her, even though she sought him out to tell him she wanted to pursue their feelings romantically.

 
In the last few sentences of the book, Clary meets a woman named Madeline in her mother’s hospital who tells her that her mother has put herself in her comatose state and with Madeline’s help, Clary can help break the spell her mother has placed on herself.

The Liebster Blog Award!

I was tagged by the lovely Sylvia from “If You Gave A Girl A Book“ 
with the Liebster Blog Award! Thanks so much for thinking of me! 

Directions

1. Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog and link back to the blogger who presented the award to you.

2. Answer the 11 questions from the nominator and create 11 questions for your nominees.

3. Present the Liebster Blog Award to 11 blogs of 200 followers or less

4. Copy and paste the Blog Award onto your blog. 

Sylvia’s Great Questions!

1. If you were trapped on an island, what three book characters would you bring with you?

This is a very tricky question, as I am a very practical person and would like to say people like Robinson Crusoe, Pi from The Life of Pi, and someone hardy from The Swiss Family Robison. However, if this were an island where I would be able to enjoy myself and have all my needs met without worry of survival, I would say Rhett Butler from Gone with the Wind to spice things up, Stephanie Plum from Janet Evanovich’s numbers series to bemoan the probable absence of junk food on the island with me, and Sookie Stackhouse, because Eric can fly, and I’m sure he would come to our rescue and our adventures on the island would give Charlaine Harris enough inspiration to launch another 12 books.

2. Favorite antagonist?
I can’t really think of anyone. Hmm… Hilly Holbrook, from The Help?

3. Favorite protagonist?
Scarlett O’Hara. I recently watched Gone with the Wind with two friends: one of which hadn’t seen the movie before and one who saw it but only when she was a small child. While I spent the entire film rooting for Scarlett, they just could not like her. In my opinion, she’s a woman who gets handed a bad hand in life but does what she needs to do to make the best of it. Yes, she is a bit cut-throat in her methods, but that woman takes on the world to provide for her family. I see a lot of myself in her, and I admire her strength and versatility.

4. Which literary world would you NOT go to?  
The only two I can really think of are those in The Hunger Games and Divergent. The one in My Name is Memory would kind of suck, too. The Night Circus wouldn’t be too bad, though.

5. What does your bookmark look like?
I did a very short-lived “Daily Book Pic” project a long time ago, and I posted a picture of some of my favorite bookmarks here.

6. Most inspirational book?
Half the Sky by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. I only read half of it before it was due at the library, so I never reviewed it, but my gosh, it wanted me to drop everything I was doing in college and run off to Asia to save children from sex trafficking. It was the most inspiring thing I had ever read. I spent months afterwards Googling job opportunities in non-profit companies to make a change in the world myself. I really need to pick the book back up again and write a proper review of how beautiful it was.

7. Book(s) that made you cry?
I cry about everything: Disney movies, every time the song “The Gambler” by Fun. comes on (seriously, listen to it and tell me you don’t start sobbing, too), and when I get nostalgic for my childhood. Of course, this means I cry over a lot of books: pretty much anything by Jodi Piccoult, Gone with the Wind, The Time Traveler’s Wife, The Fault in Our Stars, Then Came You, The Secret Lives of Dresses, pretty much anything by Cecelia Ahern, and most recently The Girl Who Chased the Moon. Pretty much chick lit makes me tear up. It’s a problem.

8. Favorite author(s) of all time?
Some favorites: Jane Austen and Margaret Mitchell, Marian Keyes, Cecelia Ahern, and Charlaine Harris.

9. If you could write a children’s book, what message would you provide?
Acceptance. Acceptance of different races, religions, body types, sexual orientation, etc. Do I feel like this book really needs to be written, though? Not especially. Many of the children I have met are so unbelievably accepting of anyone and everyone, and it’s so inspiring to think that one day, if I ever have children, they will be judged not by their background, religion, or orientation, but their choices and opinions.

10. Do you judge a book by its cover?
Yes, and it sometimes gets me in horrible situations. See the post I did a year and a half ago on The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake. Usually I’m not too bad when it comes to picking books out by their covers. I know what I like, and I know what it looks like. Sometimes there are notable exceptions, however, the Lemon Cake book was one of them.

11. Describe your favorite place to read.
It’s winter, and I am a cold-blooded creature. I am constantly shivering from November until April. I love to take baths to warm up, and I always tote a book in there with me. In the summertime, I usually read in my room, lying sideways across my bed in front of a fan. Nothing special. I would love a book nook in my future house, though. I have two gorgeous English chairs that are perfect for draping your body across while reading a book, but they’re currently packed in the basement, waiting until I get a place of my own to properly use them.  

I’m going to be lame and not tag anyone because I feel like other people don’t like these things as much as I do. If you want to do the questions, feel free! I’ll try to make up some good ones for you:

1. What book have you read more often than any other?
2. Where did you get the last book you read?
3. You’re dying of frost bite and locked in a room with all of the books you own, an empty fireplace, and a box of matches. Help is on its way, but you need to burn one book in your possession in order to stave off death. What book do you choose?
4. What is the best “required reading” (you know, for school) book that you ever read?
5. Who introduced you to your favorite author?
6. To you, whose death in the Harry Potter series was the most tragic?
7. Book face. Right here, right now. (For those of you who aren’t tuned into Book Face, basically take a picture of your face and a book). 
8. If you had to get a book-related tattoo, what would you get? 
9. What is the best mystery you’ve ever read?
10. What book has been sitting, unread, on your shelf the longest and why haven’t you read it?
11. What’s the last book you just couldn’t finish?

Okay, so those questions aren’t the best, but I did another one of these a few weeks ago, and I think the questions I came up with are better on that one. 

Sapphire Blue

by Kerstin Gier (translated by Anthea Bell)

Genre: Young Adult
Rating: 2.5/5
Released: 30Oct2012
Pages: 368
Format: Audiobook

Sapphire Blue is the second book in the “Edelestein Trilogie,” written by German author Kerstin Gier. This post will contain minor spoilers from the first book in the series, Ruby Red. Please do not continue unless you’ve read the first book.

In Sapphire Blue, teenage time traveler Gwyneth Shepherd continues on her journey to fulfill her destiny. Taking place only a day or so after Ruby Red ends, not much has happened to Gwyneth since we last saw her. Her cousin Charlotte is still a stuck-up know-it-all, her best friend Lesley is still supportive, and her travelling companion, Gideon, is still a dream boat. This book sees Gwyneth make a new old friend (as confusing as that sounds) in her presently-deceased grandfather, and she makes an important ally in a slightly annoying gargoyle. Also new to the scene is Raphael, Gideon’s rebellious younger brother, who reappears in Gideon’s life when he runs away from Gideon’s step-father’s home.

Gwyn spends a lot of time taking lessons with a mean dance instructor and making short visits to the past to meet with her grandfather. A majority of the book is dedicated to Gideon’s bizarre mood swings towards Gwyn, which sees him kiss her one day and ignore her the next. One of the biggest events in the second book is Gwyn’s second trip back in time to visit Count Sain-Germain. Her last visit back in time to meet with the fearsome Count ended in physical pain as the man choked her telekinetically. On her visit in Sapphire Blue, however, Gwyneth experiences emotional pain as the patriarch reveals some hard truths about her relationship with Gideon.

Overall, I was expecting there to be more substance to this book. Ruby Red contained a lot of foreshadowing, and it was pretty easy to guess where the series was going to go from there. I already knew what the “Secret of the Raven” was, Lucy and Paul’s relationship to Gwyneth, and what would ultimately happen when the chronograph was completed. I was expecting a lot of these pretty obvious plot twists to be revealed in Sapphire Blue so that the final book in the series could be exciting and mysterious and not have to dwell too much on the obvious. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. About one and a half secrets were revealed in this book, but Gier is still leaving a lot of obvious answers to be discovered in Emerald Green which makes me wonder whether or not it’s worth reading. 

Altogether, this book was a filler. I didn’t think it did much for the overall storyline of the Edelestein trilogy, and the few little nuggets of character development contained in Ruby Red could have easily fit in to the first book in the series.

I mildly enjoyed my time while reading this book, and it certainly wasn’t awful, but I didn’t really feel engaged throughout most of it. There were a few instances of brief action. The back-and-forth emotions of Gideon kind of put a damper on the romantic side of the book. There were parts that were a bit funny, but overall, I was left wondering what I had spent the last nine hours listening to. 

2/5 

Speaking from Among the Bones

A Flavia de Luce Novel
by Alan Bradley

Genre: Mystery
Rating: 5/5
Released: 29Jan2013 
Pages: 400
Format: Audiobook

This is the fifth book in the Flavia de Luce series, preceded by The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag, A Red Herring Without Mustard, and I Am Half-Sick of Shadows. I am a massive fan of Flavia, and I can barely express how enamored I am with this series. This review will not contain any big spoilers (until the spoilers section, of course), but some of my other reviews of the first few books in the series may be a little more enlightening about Flavia’s world as a whole. I would also like to add as an interesting side-note that this series has been optioned to become a television series in Britain. Also notable: the series has been extended from six books to ten! Exciting things lie ahead for Flavia de Luce! 

It is almost Easter in Bishop’s Lacey, and Flavia de Luce is anxiously awaiting her next investigation. Having solved four murders in the past year, eleven-year-old Flavia is on a roll and just waiting for the next disaster to strike. There is certainly enough going on in the village to distract her, however. Her beautiful older sister, Ophelia, appears to have narrowed her suitors down to one, her family’s financial crisis is more pressing than ever, and the village church is about to exhume the body of its namesake, Saint Tankred. Because of Flavia’s passion for poisons and immense curiosity about death, she cannot help but snoop around the church on the day of the big reveal, where she stumbles upon yet another corpse. So begins Flavia’s fifth investigation into an unusual death in Bishop’s Lacey. 

With the help of her father’s butler, Dogger, and the village gossip, Mrs. Mullet,  along with a host of other minor characters, Flavia is able to piece together clues that will help uncover not only the mystery of the man’s untimely death but also reveal a bit more about the life of her mother, Harriet. Having lost her mother shortly after her birth, Flavia clings to every new piece of information that surfaces about her mother. As she creeps around the countryside, Flavia meets old friends of Harriet as she continues to piece together the mystery of her late mother’s life. 

The crime itself was very well-written, with the murder being tied, in part, to the history of Bishop’s Lacey and the remains of Saint Tankred. The crime also serves to shine some light onto the history of the de Luce family, as well. Though the crime was well-done, as always, I read this book primarily for the fiction. Flavia’s beginning to get into her difficult pre-teen years, and her mood swings in this book make her an even more realistic character. Interestingly enough, even with the mood swings, puberty is also making her get along with her sisters a lot better, and that will lead to some interesting scenarios in the next few books. I am as enamored with the setting of Bishop’s Lacey as I was in my first reading, and I think this series is one of the rare ones that is improving with each new book released.

A word of caution, however: this book ends with a major cliffhanger. It’s actually a scenario I personally had mused over several times in my reading, and I was very excited to see something from my imagination pop right into the story. Since I’m one of the most impatient people in the world, the cliffhanger has rather irked me, as I’ll have to wait a full year for the next in the series to come out, so if you’re impatient, as well, it may be best to try staggering these books out a bit!

Spoilers.

Holy cliffhanger! 

Okay, before I get into that, I would first like to note that Ophelia has chosen Deiter as her main man, and the two are engaged at the start of this book. I was a bit bummed out to hear that she didn’t end up going with the detective, but I like Deiter, too. It’ll be interesting to see Ophelia mature in the next few books and how her relationship with Flavia will change when she leaves Buckshaw to become a married woman. 

Okay, and now the intense spoiler: Harriet has been found. Alive. I have thought about this so much while reading that I can scarcely believe it’s really happening. I absolutely cannot wait for the next book in the series to see how Flavia and her mother get on, especially after Flavia’s father saying she is just like her mother. Like I said at the beginning of this post, exciting things lie ahead of Flavia de Luce! 

City of Bones

(Mortal Instruments Book 1)
by Cassandra Clare

Genre: Young Adult
Rating: 4/5
Released: 27Mar2007
Pages: 496
Reminds Me Of: Supernatural

Clary Fray is a teenage girl growing up in New York City with her artsy mother and cool best friend, Simon. One night, while hanging out at a dance club with Simon, Clary sees a young man get attacked by a group of teenagers covered in strange markings. When Clary follows them, her eyes are opened to a world that exists alongside her own but carefully concealed behind “glamours” that mask the supernatural to the normal human eye. She confronts the teenagers and finds that they are, in fact, “Shadowhunters” who have been tasked with ridding the Earth of demons.

Not long after, Clary finds her home ransacked, her mother kidnapped, and a nasty demon lying in wait, ready to kill her. Luckily, a Shadowhunter named Jace has been following Clary ever since the incident in the club, and he is able to sneak her away to safety at the Shadowhunter safe house in NYC: the Institute. It is at the Institute that Clary finds a new home and a new purpose: to help the Shadowhunters in their quest to rescue Clary’s mother from the evil Shadowhunter Valentine, the man who waged war on his brethren and stole the Mortal Cup, an ancient artifact that enables one to create an army of strong Shadowhunters but claims the lives of many small children as a result. In the meantime, Clary uncovers family secrets that will have her questioning who she is and change her destiny forever.

Altogether, this book was very, very well written. The characters were surprisingly easy to relate to (extra props to Clare for creating a strong redhead protagonist), the pace was quick, and the descriptions of the world Clary inhabits were arresting. I picked up this book because I thought the trailer for the movie looked interesting (and because so many people on Tumblr LOVE it), and I absolutely cannot wait to see the movie now. The brilliant settings Clare describes in this book will translate beautifully on the screen. I also would like to commend Clare for her mastery of the English language. There were plenty of words I didn’t recognize seamlessly interwoven in the text, and I felt like I learned some very useful vocabulary for not only my writing but my score in Words with Friends.

While City of Bones is very well-written and a definite page-turner, there were a few points in the book where I felt Clare cheapened my experience. I was able to anticipate many of the plot twists very far in advance, but it was as if Clare sensed my anticipation and threw a few extra twists in the story that threw me for a loop. These were not, however, plot twists that made my reading experience better. I found myself standing up and saying, “WTF?!” instead of “Aha!” There were some very cheap tricks thrown in, especially at the end, that made me feel as though Clare did not respect my time as a reader. 

The plot was also a bit uninspired. The premise was interesting, the writing was good, and the world Clare envisioned was well put together, but the plot itself was overdone. I’ll discuss this more in the spoilers, but let’s just say that the basic storyline mirrored one of a classic motion picture, and I did not appreciate the resemblance. The themes in the book, meanwhile, were eerily similar to Supernatural, especially when it came to lore based on religious writings. 

Altogether, City of Bones was a really good young adult read, and even though I was a bit unimpressed by the plot, it had enough fantastic elements to have me interested in reading the second book in the series. I would recommend this to any young adult reader interested in a strong female protagonist dealing with issues surrounding family, love, and choosing ones way in life. 

Spoilers.

To put it simply: this book had the plot of Star Wars and with the theme of Supernatural. As my friend Sabs put it: “A kid grows up not knowing who they really are… the love interest is a sibling… the bad guy is the father… It sounds like Star Wars.” Reading it, when it’s revealed that the two characters I was shipping the hardest were, in fact, siblings, I felt like I had just wasted my time and energy brooding over a relationship between two fictional characters that could not exist. Ugh! Anyway, moving on to a quick recap of all of the most important spoilers in the book…

Clary realizes she is a Shadowhunter whose mother asked a warlock, Magnus Bane, to block out the memories of the earliest part of her life so that she can lead a normal existence as the two hide out in New York City, far away from the Shadowhunter world. When Clary’s mother is kidnapped, she begins to sense she is different, and Magnus reveals the truth about his part in her life and states that her memories will begin to come back slowly as she uncovers the Shadowhunter world. 

As far as relationships go, she falls for Jace and makes out with him, getting Simon in a tiffy as he reveals he’s been in love with her for years. Of course, finding out near the end of the book that Jace is Clary’s brother, it’s logical to assume Simon’s going to be the leading man in her life in the books to come. Side note: Alec, who was raised with Jace, is a closeted gay and not-so-secretly in love with him but may or may not have had a fling with Magnus while recovering from an injury. 

Meanwhile, Lucas, her mother’s best friend, is revealed to be a werewolf who used to be in a Shadowhunter group with both Valentine and Clary’s mother (who, by the way, used to be married, making the evil Valentine Clary and Jace’s father). Another side note: Jace’s tutor and friend, Hodge, was also in this group and ends up betraying everyone when he secretly sides with Valentine against the good guys. At the end of the book, Valentine steals the Mortal Cup from Clary and Jace and escapes into a portal back to Idris, the capital of the secret Shadowhunter country. 

Getting to that $25 threshold for free Amazon shipping!

Though I get most of my books from the library, yard sales, and Goodwill, I sometimes venture onto Amazon to buy books I cannot find anywhere else. As I am not an Amazon Prime member, I often find myself having to buy $25 worth of books to score free shipping, and I never fail to find a combination of books that costs $24.68 and wind up going over budget when I have to select another book to add to my cart.

Now, I no longer need to.

I present you with FillerItem.com – the website that makes sure you’ll never have to worry about going over-budget just for free shipping. Just go to the page and enter how much you need to reach the $25 mark: 

And click “search” to see all the things you can get for that price! Popular items are listed in bold and “very popular products” have pictures next to them.

Maybe I’m a little late to the game, but this website is amazing. I couldn’t help but pass it on, especially for all you other budget-conscious book worms out there.