Always Me

Happy Tuesday and welcome back to Top Ten Tuesday, a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish .  This week's theme is Books That Have Been On My Shelf Since Before I Started Blogging That I Still Haven't Read Yet.  Honestly, I try to keep up on reading books that I buy, but I won't lie to myself or you - I have a serious case of tsundoku (aka letting books pile up on my shelves). Memoirs of  a Geisha  by Arthur Golden Dune  ( Dune Chronicles #1) by Frank Herbert Inkheart  ( Inkworld  #1) by Cornelia Funke Big Fish  by Daniel Wallace Finnikin of the Rock  ( Lumatere Chronicles  #1) by Melina Marchetta Cold Days ( The Dresden Files #14) by Jim Butcher The Tennant of Wildfell Hall  by Anne Bronte Shadow and Bone ( The Grisha  #1) by Leigh Bardugo Eragon  ( The Inheritance Cycle  #1) by Christopher Paolini Catch-22  ( Catch-22 #1) by Joseph Heller I need t...

Happy Monday everyone and welcome back to Music Monday! Let's share some songs we've been enjoying lately!  If you would like to play and I really hope you do, please see the rules and link up below. Rules: Every Monday share one or two of songs you've been enjoying lately.  It doesn't have to be a specific genre, new, or one of your favorites - just something you'd like to share with others.  If possible, share a music or lyric video of the song and your thoughts on the song(s), artist(s), and/or music video(s). If you would like to participate in Music Monday, please join the link up by sharing your post's url. This week I'm spotlighting one of my favorite bands, Bastille.  These two songs are tracks that have already come out and both sound excellent, so I'm very excited for the release of their new album, Wild World , on September 9th. "Good Grief" (2016) "Fake It" (2016)

Welcome to The Friday 56, a weekly meme hosted by  Freda's Voice . These are the rules: 1. Grab a book, any book. 2. Turn to page 56, or 56% on your eReader. 3. Find any sentence (or a few, just don't spoil it) that grabs you. 4. Post it. 5. Add the URL to your post in the link on Freda's most recent Friday 56 post. I'm also taking part in Book Beginnings, a weekly meme hosted by  Rose City Reader .  The rules are pretty simple - you share the first sentence or so and your initial thoughts, impressions, or whatever else it inspires.  Don't forget to link up your post's url with Rose City Reader. I've put off The Raven King ( The Raven Cycle #4) by Maggie Stiefvater for long enough!  This week I'm spotlighting the grand finale in one of my favorite series - I guess, we'll see after I finish this one, won't we?  I've just started in on it and I can't begin to describe how beyond excited I am - and exceedingly nerv...

❋  ❋  ❋ Evie, a normal teen, works for the IPCA, International Paranormal Containment Agency, her best friend is a mermaid, her ex is a faerie, and she's falling for a shapeshifter. Really, though, she isn't exactly normal because she is the only person in the world who can see through paranormal glamours. And, she just might be at the center of the faerie prophecy that promises to destroy all paranormal creatures. Paranormalcy is a unique young adult urban fantasy novel that has quite a few things going for it. I especially enjoyed White's take on classic fantasy characters and design of Evie's world. Both Reth and Lend are my two favorites from the novel. Unfortunately Evie, our leading lady, while fun and kick-butt, grated on my nerves after awhile. Her character sometimes sounds just a little too immature, but maybe I'm just a little bit too old for some of her nonsense. Overall, Kiersten White's Paranormalcy is fun and entertaining and the author d...

❋  ❋  ❋  ❋ Amani hopes her skill with a gun will be enough to win her way out of Dustwalk, a dead-end town in the desert kingdom of Miraji where mythical creatures still roam in the wild and even djinni are rumored to still practice their magic. She figures that Jin, the mysterious stranger she meets in a shooting competition, could be her way out. However, she never expected that she'd ride out of town on a mythical horse while fleeing the Sultan's army with a wanted fugitive. And, how could she have known that she would begin to fall in love with him, or that he would help her unlock her potential. I'm so glad that I finally decided to try Alwyn Hamilton's debut! I've heard so many great things about the story that, for some reason, I was concerned that it wouldn't live up to the hype. Luckily, it really does live up to it. After reading The Wrath and the Dawn , I needed more Middle Eastern inspired fantasy and, of course, I set my sights on this novel...

❋  ❋  ❋  ❋ Archie and his best friends, Jughead and Betty, are students at Riverdale High when the unthinkable happens. Archie and Betty break up! They've best friends forever and basically a couple since they were five, so this is quite a surprise to everyone. Neither are taking about what happened, but according to the rumors going around the school it's something called the #LipstickIncident. Then, a new girl moves in - she's beautiful, her family is rich, and she's a reality star, but she tends to walk all over people. Her name is Veronica and she has her sights set on Archie. I'll admit that I haven't read much Archie lately - I like the characters well enough, but the stories just seemed to be more of the same after awhile. You have to admit though, the series certainly has staying power - the characters have been around since 1941. I wanted to try this because I wanted to see how it would be given a contemporary update, and because Fiona Staples...

I'm going to  be participating in a brand new reading challenge hosted by YALSA, the Backlist Bingo Reading Challenge !  As a YA librarian and reader who loves YA literature, this will be a great way for me to work my way through older releases that I missed the first time around since I try to keep up on newer releases and trends for professional reasons (as well as personal fangirl reasons). Anyway, the goal of this challenge is to read five books from the bingo board (horizonal, vertical, or diagonal) in order to complete it, or go for a complete blackout and read all twenty-five books.  You could also do four corners or diamond.  Basically, whatever you want - the real goal is to read books from 2015 or before from YALSA's book awards and book lists  from August 15 - November 15!  The challenge is open to anyone and to help facilitate discussion YALSA will be hosting two Twitter chats, one in September and one in October. My goal is to read th...