Good morning! So it is time to start another reading vlog. This week I'm
trying to finish off the Tome Topple. So I'm going to be trying to read the
Golden Key by Melanie Rawn and Jennifer Roberson and Kate Eliot. I had read the
prologue at the beginning of the Tome Topple and then I took a break because
of the Because We Can readathon. Now I'm back to this although I'm not sure
I'm actually gonna start this today because I also need to read the Slug
Queen Chronicles. I did say I would do a review by the 23rd, which is Saturday so
I need to finish that. But I did look and it's actually a 450 page middle grade
story. Why are these middle grades always so long? Also, reading books on kindle, you
never realize how long books are unless you actually look it up. So that's close
to being a tome, so maybe I'll count it for tome topple as well. I do think I'm
gonna have to focus on this too. I think I'm being again, as I often am, completely
unrealistic about finishing both of these off by the end of the tome topple,
which is Friday. Given that I'm still playing a lot of
Animal Crossing. I do this week also need to restart my job search since now we're
on a lower level of lockdown here in New Zealand. I guess I have to start looking
into that. People are starting to go back to work.
My bank account is getting lower and lower so I need to start that. And just
in general I want to start running my pretend work schedule again. I'm kind of
cheating today and I'm doing my work schedule but including booktube stuff as
part of my work. Cheating is fine! It's my rules until I actually properly go back
to work. As well as these two physical books that I would like to finish though,
I do also have a couple of audiobooks. I've just started listening to Before
the Devil Breaks You by Libba Bray, which is the third book in the Diviners series.
This isn't a series that I necessarily love. It's like a paranormal murder
mystery series. All these people with different supernatural abilities. It's
okay, I guess. So I will be reading that and then I also have the audiobook for
the City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty. I don't know much about this one
except that it is also a tome, so both of those count for tome topple as well. So
ideally I'd like to all of these finish by Friday.
hmm it seems very unlikely but why not give it a go!
Good morning! So I thought I'd better do a quick update. It's already Thursday and
I have done hardly any reading this week. But I just I ended up having like a
few job leads that I'm following up on and I had to update my CV, which is
something I absolutely hate doing and that just took way longer than it needed
to, even though most of what I was doing was just procrastination. And, of course
I've been playing too much Animal Crossing and doing other things, just not
reading. But I have read some things! So I have listened to a bit of Before the
Devil Breaks You. I think I'm actually liking it a bit more than the previous
books. Mainly because there's a lot less focus on Evie, who was the main character
in the first one, who I didn't particularly like. But now we're focusing
more on like Theta, who's like this woman who has fire powers and she ran away
from her abusive husband to become an actress. And we've also got Memphis, who
is this black guy and so him and Theta are having this relationship and it's like a
mixed-race relationship, which since this is set in the twenties is a bit of a
drama. And we're also learning a little bit about this government agency that's
been investigating the diviners with all their different powers. So I'm enjoying
it a bit more. It's still not amazing but it's kind of nice background noise, like
a little story on the side. Anyway, I am listening to that but I'm going very
slowly. The other thing I did do on like Monday night. I read the first two
chapters of... what is this called? The Slug Queen Chronicles. This I... it's
really cute. The first couple of chapters we've got this girl who's got like
synesthesia - is that what it's called? That thing where you see colors
associated with your other senses. So when she see strong smells or sounds or
tastes, she will see colors. And she's just found
out that her mother had the same problem but her mother thought it had something
to do with like fairies and stuff. But her father thinks that her mother was
crazy. But she is now trying to catch some fairies and
her... I think just as I stopped reading her brother was about to get kidnapped.
So I am actually excited to continue this. I just don't seem to be finding
time. But ah today Jason are they gonna go for a drive, since we are allowed to
now. We might stay the night somewhere but it's very cold and also a lot of the
campsites are still closed so we might not. Either way, I'm gonna take my Kindle
and maybe I'll read something... probably not, because I hardly ever read anything
when we go away because usually we're just exploring and doing that instead.
Anyway, I haven't finished packing yet. I thought I'd update you guys to
procrastinate on doing that, because if I'm good at anything its procrastination!
Well I'm not going on that!
Hi, so it's now Sunday. I honestly don't really know what this week went. I
feel like I don't know where this year went. I'm about to film my June TBR!
Crazy! Anyway, I did have a good time away with Jason, enjoying the last of the
sunshine, because now it has started raining. But I don't particularly get
much reading done. I did try to read a little bit of the Slug Queen Chronicles
while we were away, but it felt sort of like it didn't make sense. Things are a
bit disjointed and I felt like I was missing explanations and what the
character was doing just seemed to be making leaps that I didn't understand,
which given that it's a middle-grade book, made me feel kind of dumb.
So this afternoon I am gonna go and read again from the beginning, I think
and see whether it is just that I'm dumb or whether it's just not very well
written. It could just be because I was away and trying to read it in bits and
pieces and not 100% paying attention that I missed some things. I'm hoping
it's that. Also, this morning I have been playing a lot of Animal Crossing, but at
the same time I was listening to Before the Devil Breaks You - the third book
in the Diviners series. I have now finished that and I have to say I think
this should have been the first book in the series. It's way better! The first two
books were just like set up and filler and I think that could have been done a
lot quicker and we could have got to the events that happened in this book, which
are actually interesting. I still don't know that it's more than a three-star
book for me but this is definitely the best book in the series - so far. I
still need to read the last book, which was just recently released. But in this
one we find out a bit more about what's going on with the previous generation of
Diviners, this government conspiracy that's going on, we're starting to
understand the source of the Diviners powers, all the different characters
relationships both romantic and friendship are starting to become really
interesting and a lot of the conflicts are coming into play. The characters
actually feel like they're in danger in this book. It was just way better than
the first two. I think the first two should just have
been heavily edited into a prologue. But anyway, I'm glad that I enjoyed that
better than the first two books. I have also just now started listening to
Fragments of the Lost by Megan Miranda. I don't know anything about this. I think
it's some kind of thriller. Kayla is reading it for her Literally Dead book
club and so I picked it up on audiobook. It seems interesting so far but I've
only listened to like ten minutes of it. I was just listening to it while I moved
all the books from my TBR shelves into my TBR cart because I have got few enough
books now that they can all fit in here. I mean, it's double-sided so you can't
see them all but still, we're making progress on this pile! Anyway, I'm gonna
go and film my TBR, work out which books I'm gonna be reading in June. And I will
check in with you guys later tonight. And I really will do it this time! Because I
feel like every Sunday morning I say I'll check in with you later after I've
done some more reading and then I don't. But today, I really will... I hope... because I
do want to finish off a little bit more reading today.
So no. I did not update you
last night. It's now midday Monday. I just got busy doing other things and then by
the time I'd actually done some more reading, it was late, I didn't feel very
coherent or presentable and so I just went to sleep.
So that's a lesson I think just not to try and do late-night updates because
they won't happen. Anyway, I did do some reading last night. I managed to read
about half of the Slug Queen Chronicles and I think this afternoon I'm gonna
finish it and then I'll wrap up this vlog after I give you my thoughts about
it. So far I think the reason why I keep not understanding things or thinking
things and making weird leaps is that a lot of the world building is being done by
different people telling you about things, or you just having to figure out
what's going on without really being shown it. And a lot of the details, I just
think they're like random mentions but then they turn out to be important and
I've kind of forgotten about them. Especailly since in the beginning I was
reading like a chapter and then taking a big break and then reading some
more. So that's why I think I got lost. Now I'm not lost but I do think that
this world, because it's so unique and creative and different and kind of
nonsensical, I think it needs a little bit more description than it's getting.
Regardless, I am still enjoying the story so I'm interested to see what will
happen in the second half of the book. I'm gonna try and read this this
afternoon. It shouldn't take me that long but we'll see what happens. As well this
morning and last night while I was doing other bits and pieces I finished
off Fragments of the Lost. Although I'm not sure what I thought about it. I think
I quite enjoyed it. It's a YA thriller. Those are always a little bit strange
because they don't really have the darkness or the twistedness of adult
thrillers - or good adult thrillers. So it's kind of hard for them to actually
be thrilling. But I just think it was an interesting mystery, kind of revealing
itself. We've got this girl whose ex-boyfriend has died and she is helping
to pack up all his stuff and all these different things she's coming across
leading her to different memories of what happened to them. And then she
starts discovering some secrets. I do think I enjoyed it. I think if you like
YA thrillers this is probably a good one. I mean, I definitely read it in a really
short time so that's a good sign. Anyway, I have to go and do some other stuff and
try and read the Slug Queen Chronicles. So hopefully, I'll check in with
you guys later. So I finally finished off the Slug Queen
Chronicles on my Kindle. I don't know how I feel about it. Like I really
thought the characters were really good - both the main character, Cricket, she was
quite interesting in that she doesn't really like to be touched or hugs and I
think she doesn't really understand emotions properly, so that was quite
interesting for a main character. Also, I really enjoyed the Santas in this story.
Although I don't think the tooth fairy part was as good, which given that that
was in the synopsis that the truth fairies were now stealing babies instead
of teeth - that was a part but not as big of a part as I thought it was gonna be.
The world was definitely really creative. There were some really cool ideas in
there, but I just think overall the plot was a little bit convoluted and
because of that, not as well as explained as it could have been or should have
been. So I feel like this is one where there was a lot of potential. Like with
just a few improvements maybe it could have been like a 4 star 5 star, but
instead just a 3 star. Not bad, still enjoyable, but not as good as I was
hoping. Wow, I look tired! Anyway ,as well I did it
actually manage to listen to the whole of The Vampire's Assistant by Darren Shan.
That's the second book in the Cirque Du Freak series. So the audio book is just
five hours and I was listening to it on 2 times speed so I managed to fit that
in, listening today while I was doing some other things. I really enjoyed it,
but these books are actually quite dark for middle grade books. Like we have
another death. The first book, someone kind of died and this one
another person dies. It's got vampires. It's kind of quite dark and twisted
but also light and fun for most of the book until the very end when it's like
wow crazy stuff! Anyway, I did enjoy it. I will be continuing the series. But these
books are so short! I feel like I barely even started it and then I was finished,
which I actually prefer for middle grade. Because as I said I do think the Slug
Queen Chronicles was a little bit too long. And I think that's something that's
kind of changed over time. Like I feel like older middle grade books used to be
shorter and now they're getting longer and longer and I don't know why that is.
Because I don't think it's because children's attention spans are improving
because I know adults attention spans are not improving! Anyway, so in the end I
think if I include today (even though it's Monday) if I include today in the
week, then I read four books this week. I finished three of them on Monday so
did I? Sure. Let let's say that I did. Probably my favorite of the four was
Fragments of the Lost. Probably. Anyway, since I have extended this vlog an extra day I
need to go and edit this up and try to get it uploaded. So I guess that was the
week. Another weird week. I'm really hoping things get back to normalish soon.
The week after next - next week because it's Monday - basically
in June, all our libraries are reopening and my job search will be properly going.
I kind of tried to restart it but from putting out my feelers, a lot of people
are still not hiring so I'll just kind of slowly keep searching. But anyway, I
guess that is all for now. Thank you for hanging out with me this week. I hope
that everything is going well with you and I will see you next time :)