*classical music plays*
Hello, everyone, and welcome to another autumnal reading vlog.
Today we're starting out with one of my new favorite reads of 2021:
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood.
I picked this up entirely because BookTok kept raving about it, and I'm so glad that I did.
This romance follows Olive, a Ph.D. candidate, who begins to fake day a hot shot professor who
is grumpy and aloof to the world. I read this book in two sittings. Their banter was adorable.
Their romance brought out the biggest smile on my face,
and this novel reignited my love for romance books, in general.
I'm so glad I gave this book a try and if you're looking for a heartwarming read that is
totally worth the hype, this is the book for you. Hello, everyone, my name is Olivia and welcome to
an autumn-themed reading vlog. I'm so excited to bring you all the cozy vibes and all the autumnal
vibes in this reading vlog where I will feature two books from my autumn TBR, so get ready for
that, but before we get into it, I wanted to give you a fall-themed haul for you. And this is being
sponsored by Redbubble. Redbubble is one of my favorite places to go to for gifting things to
my friends or gifting things to myself. Like 90% of the decor in my room is from Redbubble.
If you do not know what Redbubble is, it is a wonderful website that features independent
artists who upload their art onto Redbubble and they can feature their art on mugs, t-shirts,
socks, art prints, etc. and it's the perfect go-to place to get gifts for anyone of any interest.
There are countless designs on that website and there's something for everyone and because the
holiday season is quickly approaching, now is the perfect time to order your gifts from Redbubble to
ship to your house and to pack up for your friends and your family. I would highly recommend ordering
all your gifts really early because things are getting backed up, shipments are getting delayed,
and now is the perfect time to order everything that you need for the holiday season or the
autumnal season to not have any of that worry on your shoulders. So if you want to use my coupon
code, you can get 15% off your entire order, so this is the perfect opportunity to use a Redbubble
coupon code to get yourself something nice, get something for your friends, and let's get into the
haul because this might give you some inspiration as to what you should order from Redbubble.
I got a lot of things for my room and I also got a couple of things for my friends and for my family,
so I'm very excited to show you, and let's get into the fall-themed haul. So the first thing
that I want to show you is a very practical thing that I needed to get for my room: a mouse pad.
Now that I am working from home, I needed a nice mouse pad for my desk, and I was looking online
and I couldn't really find a design that I wanted until I found this wonderful minimalistic graph
design on Redbubble. It has a nice sage green color that I have quickly fallen in love with.
It's a very practical thing that I needed and it also matches like my aesthetic that I'm going for,
which is like earthy tones and just cuteness all around. Redbubble also now has coasters,
so I got myself two sets of coasters, one for the autumn season and one for just life in general.
So the one that I got for life, in general, is this cool statue succulent collage-themed
art print. I love this design. I really love statues and, like, Roman and Greek sculptures,
in general, so I'm really glad that I found this design because it is absolutely stunning.
I got an autumnal-themed coaster that features teapots, wood, mugs. Then I got two different
size pouches. So one is a mushroom pouch that my mom wanted. I showed her a couple of Redbubble
designs and she really liked the mushroom design, and I got myself a sewing-themed pouch. And this
is a pouch that I'm going to put all my sewing supplies in. It's all going to go in here because
right now I just kind of throw it around my room, and I always lose my seam ripper, and it drives me
nuts. So now I have a dedicated place to put all my sewing supplies in because, if SpongeBob
taught me anything, it's to have multiple pouches to organize your stuff. This shirt,
this Over the Garden Wall-themed shirt is featured on Redbubble. they have Over the Garden Wall
merch y'all! And it is so cute. Over the Garden Wall is one of my favorite shows of
all time. It's a wonderful Halloween-themed animated show, and when I saw that they had
Over the Garden Wall-themed merch, I had to get myself a t-shirt because I wanted an autumnal
and Halloween vibe type of shirt that isn't that overtly Halloweeny. I love the design and I loved
the color that I picked it out. I picked it out in, like, a tan color so it gives that fall vibe
without being, like, orange. And the next thing that I got from Redbubble is a notebook,
and I have way too many notebooks in my life, but this one actually has a purpose
and will be used and will not go on to the top of my bookshelf to be forgotten for years upon years.
And it is a book-themed notebook. It has a bunch of different book spines on it, and I am going to
use this for work. And the next thing I got goes with another hobby that I have and it is baking.
I got a cute apron that is somewhat fall-themed in its color scheme. It features a bunch of different
pastries, a cozy stove, some fried eggs, and just has a wonderful orangey design. Another thing
that I got for Halloween is a wonderful Halloween pixel-themed artboard, and it is just such a cute
design that you can find new things to look at every single time you look at it, and I just love
it. It's going to be another thing that I'm going to put up in my room during Halloween, and it is
just so freaking adorable. Now let's get on to some stickers because I can't do a Redbubble haul
without getting some stickers. So I got an Over the Garden Wall-themed sticker. Then I have a “The
Hot Mug Society” themed badge that reminds me of, like, those Girl Scout badges that I always wanted
in life but never got because I quit Girl Scouts before I could earn a badge because it was too
boring to attend... That's just a life story from me. I got a cute little Ice Bear-themed
sticker from We Bare Bears, and the sticker that I currently have on my phone is the pumpkin spice
latte. It's kind of like a tarot-themed sticker. It actually matches the color of my actual phone,
which is fantastic. Another thing that I got from Redbubble is a wonderful autumnal pillow. So,
during the autumnal season, I have autumn-themed pillowcases and I didn't have one for my fourth
pillow, but I finally do. I just wanted something that had this green aesthetic to it, and I'm just
so glad that I found this pillowcase. And the last two things that I have to show you are two
gifts for my friends. They both have very similar aesthetics, in the way that they both love cosmic
themes and space and astrology, so I wanted to get them both space-themed gifts. So the first
one that I have to show you is a blanket and it is a beautiful stunning moon and star-themed
blanket. And for my best friend, Camille, I got her a moon and star-themed pillowcase.
I asked her what product she wanted from Redbubble and she told me she wanted a pillow,
so I got her this pillowcase along with the insert as well, and it is just so beautiful
and so Camille. Like she's going to love it so much. I cannot wait to give it to her,
and that is my entire Redbubble haul. I will leave the link to all the different products that I got,
down below, if you want to get a product that I got, and, again, if you want to get 15%
off of your purchase, use my code, which will be featured right here,
from now until January 31st 2022. So you have a lot of time to use this, but remember to
order early because you don't want your gifts to be delayed during the holiday season. Thank you
so much to Redbubble for sponsoring this video. I appreciate you so much, and I'm so happy that
I was able to show off a little fall haul for you all, and let's get into the autumnal reading vlog.
*classical music plays*
So I am currently reading Plain Bad Heroines, but I am also beginning to start The Labyrinth
of the Spirits by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. I am 126 pages into Plain Bad Heroines and I am listening
to my audiobook while I read alongside it because it's a bit dry, and it's a bit hard to get into,
so I have the audiobook, thanks to Libro.fm. They kindly offered me a review copy of the audiobook,
so I'm listening to that while I read alongside it physically, and I feel like that's making the
process of getting through this novel a lot easier because, I think if I were to have read it myself,
it would have taken me a lot longer to get to page 126. And if you have not heard me talk about
Plain Bad Heroines in previous videos, it says it is a “horror-comedy centered around a cursed
New England boarding school for girls. A wickedly whimsical celebration of the art of storytelling,
sapphic love, and new rebellious female spirit.” I have to disagree about the comedy portion
of that synopsis. There's nothing comedic about people dying in the university and then them
making a movie about it. I don't know. I don't have a sense of humor, so maybe I'm just like
missing the comedic aspect of Plain Bad Heroines, but maybe it gets comedic more
towards the middle of the story. Either way, I am slowly getting through Plain Bad Heroines, and I
will not be finishing it in this vlog because it already took me so long to get to page 126.
I don't think I would be able to finish it in this vlog, This vlog would be weeks long,
but I am also reading The Labyrinth of the Spirits and I started this yesterday. I'm only on page 8,
but it's slow and steady, you know? This is much easier to get through because I'm used
to Carlos Ruiz Zafon's writing. I'm used to his story flow and his structure, and it's very easy
to get through his stories, compared to Plain Bad Heroines, which is a little bit drier and
it has a lot of different perspectives. So I'm kind of like flip-flopping between so
many different people and trying to catch up with all the information that I'm bombarded with. So
I started this because I feel like this would be an easier reading process for me. So I think I'm
going to focus more on my time on The Labyrinth of the Spirit and occasionally read a little bit more
of Plain Bad Heroines. I don't know if I'm going to get any further in this story for this vlog,
but I am flip-flopping between these two books. I also realized that I did not give you a synopsis
for either of these books. So Plain Bad Heroines follows a bunch of different points of views, but
the overall aspect of the story is the fact that these two girls in 1902 died at this university,
and, a couple of years later, the university closed down. So, in the future, someone wrote
a book about the mysterious death that happened at that university and they are now translating
it into a movie. So we follow these two actresses who are going to play the protagonist of the movie
as they are preparing to film it, and I think it says that they go to the actual academy to
kind of delve deeper into the story and maybe even film there. I remember reading that in a synopsis,
but I don't really remember what else the synopsis said, so that's all I really know about the story.
So far so we are flip-flopping between so many different characters to get their points of views.
There's footnotes. There's illustrations. It's a very immersive multimedia type of read
that I am excited to get deeper into, but it is a very slow-going book but with The Labyrinth of the
Spirits, I have quite literally no idea what this book is about. All I know is that mixes
together multiple genres and it says “fantasy, historical, romance, police procedural, and
political.” So I have really enjoyed The Cemetery of Forgotten Books series, and I really wanted to
wrap it up and see what this fourth book is about, and I actually got this on my birthday in 2020
and I didn't realize that a whole entire year passed and I have not read this book yet. So I
really do want to get deeper into the story and this is what I'm hoping to read today and get a
little bit deeper into it because, like, I said, I'm only eight pages into it, so hopefully I can
get to maybe page 50. I think that would be great, so that is my update for both of these books.
*classical music plays*
Hello, everyone, and I have a couple of bookish updates before we wrap up at the end of this
reading vlog. One major update is that I DNF'd Plain Bad Heroines. I got about 33% through
this novel when I th ought to myself, I'm not truly enjoying this story. I'm really slogging
through it. There hasn't been a lot of action and there's not a lot keeping me reading the story.
I'm not truly interested in the characters or the plot, and the plot just moved very slowly for me,
and if I'm already one-third of the way through the story, there has to be a reason for me to
keep on reading, and I couldn't seem to find one. I really had to force myself to sit down and read
more of the story, and that's just not the type of book that I'm trying to read. I feel like,
if I were to try and read this entire novel, it would put me into a book slump because it just
was not my cup of tea, so rather than pushing myself through a novel that doesn't bring me a
lot of joy, I decided to DNF it and focus my time on The Labyrinth of the Spirits, which I am only
about 50 pages through. I am listening to this on audiobook while I read alongside it because
the beginning is a little bit slow, along with other Zafon books. They take a bit to get into,
but once you get into it, you really enjoy it. So I'm only about 50 pages into it,
also because I have not had the time to sit down and read this story, which makes me so sad. I wish
I had more time in a day to be able to sit down and get through this novel because I really want
to know what's going to happen next, and I know it's going to get better, but I just don't have
the time to sit down and read it. So I'm really sad that I don't have any more updates for you all
for this novel, but I do want to let you know that I started it and I hopefully will finish it soon,
and, even though it's 800 pages, I really do hope that I can fly through the story, like I did with
The Angel’s Game, which I finished in a couple of days, and it was a pretty long book but once
I dove into it, I really enjoyed the story. So I'm hoping that this is similar to that in that vein,
but those are all the reading updates that I have to share with you for this reading vlog.
We finished a five-star read, which was The Love Hypothesis, which completely won me over and just
made me so happy. I DNF'd a very anticipated read that I thought would be perfect for autumn
but just was not for me, and then I started a book that I've been meaning to read for over a
year now, and I'm really glad that I started it and I hopefully will get deeper into it soon.
So, before I go, if you want to order anything from Redbubble, be sure to use my coupon code,
which will be put right here, and be sure to check out all the other things that I got from Redbubble
by clicking the link in my description. The coupon code is good for now until January 31st 2022,
and thank you so much for Redbubble for sponsoring this video and giving me amazing things to make my
room feel a little bit more autumnal. If you want to follow me anywhere else, all my social media
links will be down below. Thank you so much for watching, and I will see you around. bye~