Top Ten Tuesday: All-Time Favourite Book Covers

Welcome to another Top Ten Tuesday post. This is a weekly feature that’s hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s theme is actually ‘All-time favourite books from X genre’ and I was really excited to share my favourites but then I realised that I talk about my favourites all the time and you’re probably sick of hearing about the same books over and over again. I was fully intending to skip this week’s TTT but then inspiration struck when I couldn’t stop raving about how beautifully packaged The Thousandth Floor is. So my topic for today’s list is “all-time favourite book covers”. I also happen to really love all of these books on my list so take this as my list of recommendations!

1. The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee

Since this whole list is inspired by this book, it had to be at the top of my list. I love everything about this cover and how this book is packaged. It has a beautiful smooth texture and a beautiful embossed title. The spine is also amazing and is probably my favourite part of this whole book. The endpapers are also stunning and finally, when you undress the book, the naked hardcover has the title on it in beautiful gold lettering.

2. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

This is my favourite book of all time and there really isn’t any part of it that I don’t absolutely love. The cover is stunning. I love the colours and that the cover is slightly shimmery. It’s so beautiful!!

3. The Weight of Feathers by Anna-Marie McLemore

This novel is one of my favourite reads of 2016 so far. I love the colours on the cover, as well as the feathers and the branches. I just think that it’s very beautifully simplistic.

4. Nevernight by Jay Kristoff

This cover is just stunning. The illustration of the bird is so detailed and I could spend hours and hours just staring at it and trying to figure it out. I have the Australian paperback edition but I’ve seen the UK hardcover addition and omg it’s BEAUTIFUL.

5. I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson

The picture I’ve included doesn’t do this cover justice. It’s absolutely beautiful in real life and the debossed lines on the cover, as well as on the naked hardback is not only beautiful to the eyes but wonderful to touch. This is my favourite YA novel of all time and I’m so happy that it has an insanely pretty cover too.

6. Everything Everything by Nicola Yoon

I love not only the illustrations on the cover, which are so stunning and detailed, but also the texture of the cover. I have the hardcover edition and it’s got a wonderful matte cover and I love touching it so much!

7. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

I love the covers of all three books in this trilogy but I had to mention this one because it’s the first. I think the covers of Hollow City and Library of Souls are really mysterious and unique but this first book just has a really iconic cover. I love that it’s greyscale and that it’s just so peculiar!

8. The Smell of Other People’s Houses by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock

I mean, just look at this cover. Just look at it! The colours are so pretty and there’s nothing that I can say about it that you can’t already see.

9. My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga

What I love most about this book is the texture of it. The black hole on the cover is stitched and I love feeling the raised bits of thread. I don’t like that it’s not centred but other than that, it’s perfection. I also really love the debossed black hole on the naked hardcover.

10. Passenger by Alexandra Bracken

I love the font and the embossed lettering of the title. When I first got this book, I couldn’t stop feeling it. I also really like the bottle and the ship. I just think that it’s a beautifully designed cover!

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Anticipated Releases for the Second Half of 2016

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by the team at The Broke and the Bookish. This week I’m featuring ten upcoming 2016 releases that I’m very highly anticipating. These will all be released in the second half of this year.

1. Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo

I absolutely loved Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo. It was definitely a step up from her Grisha trilogy. The characters and the relationships between them were so good and I can’t wait to read more about them. I’m so sad that this is only a duology though. I’ve already preordered this one and it comes out on September 27 😀

2. Blood for Blood by Ryan Graudin

Wolf by Wolf was another book that I really loved when I read it last year. It’s such an exciting and action-paced story and I love that it’s an alternate history novel. I also really enjoyed the prequel novella, Iron to Iron. Cannot wait to get my hands on this sequel. Again, I’m sad that it’s a duology and not a trilogy. November 1 could not come soon enough!

3. Heartless by Marissa Meyer

The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer is probably my favourite series of all time. So I cannot wait to get my hands on this upcoming release, which is a retelling of Alice in Wonderland. November 8 is the release date for this novel.

4. Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas

I recently read ACOMAF by Sarah J. Maas and didn’t enjoy it very much so my excitement for this fifth book of the Throne of Glass series has dampened a little bit. But I’ve been enjoying where the series has been going so I guess I’m still excited to see where this next book goes. This is out on September 6.

5. Frost Like Night by Sara Raasch

I’m highly anticipating this third and final book of the Snow Like Ashes trilogy. I absolutely loved Snow Like Ashes and it became one of my favourite novels of all time… but Ice Like Fire really disappointed me. I have a feeling that this finale is going to be epic though! It comes out on September 20.

6. The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon

I really enjoyed Nicola Yoon’s debut novel, Everything Everything. It had really interesting formatting and lots of beautiful illustrations. I’m hoping that The Sun is Also a Star will have those elements too. The synopsis also sounds very intriguing and I love a female protagonist who loves science. This novel comes out on November 1.

7. Replica by Lauren Oliver

I haven’t read anything by Lauren Oliver yet but I’m drawn in by the gimmicky nature of this book. The book can be read four ways and I think it’d be great to experience it. Also, from what I’ve read of the synopsis, it sounds like an intriguing sci-fi read. This is out on October 4.

8. PS. I Like You by Kasie West

Who can resist a new Kasie West book? Her novels are so quick and easy to read and absolutely perfect for a reading slump. I’ve enjoyed all of her books so far and I’m keen to read more from her. Also, this one comes out on July 26, so not too long to go!

9. Paper and Fire by Rachel Caine

This is the sequel to Ink and Bone, which I read earlier this year and absolutely fell in love with. It’s such a great alternate history story that’s all about books and the Great Library of Alexandria. I can’t wait to continue the series and see how it all plays out. This one also comes out really soon on July 5.

10. Cure For the Common Universe by Christian McKay Heidicker

I honestly don’t know too much about this book but it has a really fun cover and the main character is sent to video game rehab. If that doesn’t sound like a lot of fun, I don’t know what does. And whoops, I thought this one was out in July but it’s actually out today! June 14.

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Which one of these are you also highly anticipating? Also, if you haven’t already, check out my 1 year blogoversary giveaways.

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Debut Authors Who Have Me Looking Forward To Their Sophomore Novel

Another Tuesday, which means another Top Ten Tuesday! This is a weekly feature hosted by the team over at The Broke and The Bookish. This week’s topic is top debut authors who have me looking forward to their next release. I have ten 2015 debut authors to share, so let’s get started.

1. Becky Albertalli

Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda is one of my all-time favourite contemporaries! It’s a light and adorable read, with a really important message. It’s an absolutely fantastic LGBTQ+ book that I think all young readers would enjoy!

2. Nicola Yoon

There was so much hype surrounding this YA debut and I loved it just as much as everybody else seemed to. It was creative and had lots of wonderful illustrations in it. Hopefully Nicola’s next book is just as wonderful as Everything Everything!

3. Adam Silvera

More Happy Than Not was a book that gave me all the feels. I cried like a baby when the book was over and immediately wanted to read something else by Adam Silvera. Sadly, he only had one book available. I’m super excited to see what his next book is about!

4. Renee Ahdieh

The Wrath and the Dawn was probably my favourite fantasy debut that I read this year (not that I read very many to begin with). I thought it was such a great beginning to the duology. It had a fantastic set of characters and the romance was OMG. I devoured this book in just one day.

5. David Arnold

I really liked David Arnold’s debut novel, Mosquitoland, but was frustrated with the writing style. It was overly purple prose-y and I wished it was slightly more comfortable to read. I enjoyed the story a lot so I’m still excited to pick up something else by him.

6. Jasmine Warga

I read My Heart and Other Black Holes at the beginning of the year and I loved it. I read a whole pile of books on depression and mental illness at around the same time and this debut novel really stood out as one of the best.

7. Erin Gough

The Flywheel is an Aussie YA debut that blew me away! It’s a wonderful LGBTQ+ novel and it’s one of my favourite diverse books. This book is set in Sydney and it was wonderful to be able to read a book and know where the places are. This is probably my favourite OzYA book so I highly recommend it, if you can get your hands on it.

8. Meg Haston

I really enjoyed Paperweight by Meg Haston. It was an emotional book about eating disorders and is set in a treatment facility. I thought it was a wonderful representation of eating disorders and it’s a really important book that needs to be read! I can’t wait to see what Meg Haston brings next.

9. Lauren James

The Next Together was a book that I read recently and really enjoyed. It was unique in its concept and was executed pretty well. It’s the first book in a duology so I can’t wait to see what the next book is about.

10. Melinda Salisbury

I read The Sin Eater’s Daughter at the beginning of the year and thought it was a pretty good first book in a new fantasy trilogy. I had some problems with it but loved the direction that it took at the end. Can’t wait to see what happens next.

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My honourable mention goes to Sophie Kinsella’s Finding Audrey. I know that she’s not a debut author since she’s released a million adult books, but Finding Audrey is her first YA novel and I thought it was delightful! I hope she continues to write YA books because I’d pick them up in a heartbeat.

Wrap Up: September 2015

I read quite a lot of books in September but I kind of got stuck in a bit of a slump towards the middle of the month. A Little Life was so good that I had a bit of a book hangover, and it also didn’t help that I read a string of books that were quite average after it. But let’s get into what I read because I still managed to complete my 150 book challenge on Goodreads (which I’ve now increased to 200 books).

I am currently reading Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs. Stay tuned for a review on that!

As always, these books are listed in the order that I read them during the month, and my reviews are linked.

1. Queen of Shadows – Sarah J. Maas
This is the fourth book in the Throne of Glass series and it was so good! A really great continuation to the series and it ended so epically as well. Looking forward to Book 5!

2. Hello, Goodbye and Everything In Between – Jennifer E. Smith
This new contemporary release from Jennifer E. Smith did not disappoint. This book is about two high school graduates and their last night together as they try to figure out whether to break up or go long distance.

3. Everything Everything – Nicola Yoon
A fast-paced and cute contemporary about a girl with SCID. This book has received so much hype and it’s all well deserved.

4. A Little Life – Hanya Yanagihara
This was by far the best read of September for me. It took me 2 weeks to read but it was so worth it! Check out my review for in depth thoughts because this book is not for everyone.

5. Supermutant Magic Academy – Jillian Tamaki
This was my first graphic novel in a while and it was just okay for me. I didn’t find it to be as funny as some other reviewers found it. It’s a very slice-of-life kind of book.

6. Afternoon Tea at the Sunflower Cafe – Milly Johnson
This was a really fun book about female friendships and getting revenge on the men who have wronged you.

7. Fans of the Impossible Life – Kate Scelsa
A book about friendship and mental illness… I had many, many problems with not only the messages but also the writing style. Wasn’t really worth my time.

8. Dumplin’ – Julie Murphy
A book with a great message about body weight and confidence. I loved the messages in this book but there were some things that I wish had been better executed.

9. Mosquitoland – David Arnold
A really enjoyable book about a crazy road trip and friendship. There was a lot that I enjoyed about it but it was a bit too purple prose-y for me to fully enjoy.

10. The Replacement Wife – Rowena Wiseman
This is my least favourite read of the month, and probably one of my least favourite reads ever. I requested this on NetGalley because the author is Australian and it was a short book. Worst. Decision. Ever. It was a book full of terrible decisions and terrible writing.

11. The Substitute Bride – Kathleen O’Brien
I just realised that this book has pretty much the same title as the previous one, but this was a much better read. I saw this in the free books section on iBooks so I downloaded it to give it a go. It was a really charming and enjoyable book.

12. The Rest Of Us Just Live Here – Patrick Ness
My first Patrick Ness book did not disappoint. It had a great premise and was executed really well. This is a book about all the other kids in the world and what happens to them when the chosen ones are off saving the world.

13. The Heart Goes Last – Margaret Atwood
A married couple living in a chaotic and anarchic world sign up to live in a utopia forever. They soon realise that this utopia is definitely more of a dystopia. A bit of a weird read for me. I still don’t really know how I feel about it.

14. Tonight The Streets Are Ours – Leila Sales
This is a love story, but it’s not about romance. It’s a book about loving yourself and putting yourself first. This was definitely the surprise of the month!

15. The Landing – Susan Johnson 
Set in a small coastal town in Australia, an exploration of the joys and disappointments of love and humanity.

16. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass – Lewis Carroll
I don’t think this needs any introduction. I’ve read Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland before but this was my first time reading Through the Looking Glass. It was wonderful in parts but a bit draggy in others.

I did five Top Ten Tuesday posts this month:

• 01-09-15: Ten Characters I Just Didn’t Click With
• 08-09-15: Ten Finished Series I Have Yet To Start
• 15-09-15: Top Ten Books I’ve Read So Far This Year
• 22-09-15: Top Ten Books On My Spring TBR
• 29-09-15: Ten Books To Read If You Like…

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I also did a giveaway this month to celebrate my birthday. And the winner of that giveaway was Kelly @ Dancing Through The Pages!

If you’ve done a September wrap up, leave me a link in the comments! I would love to check out what you’ve read!

Review: Everything Everything by Nicola Yoon

Publisher: Delacourte Press
Release date: September 1, 2015
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 0553496646
Pages: 306
Goodreads || Book Depository

My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.

But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He’s tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.

Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.

MY THOUGHTS

Everything Everything is a wonderful book about taking risks and living life to its fullest potential. While it did tackle some serious issues, the overall tone of the book for me was quite light-hearted and it felt very refreshing. This book made me feel so hopeful and happy that I forgave some of its flaws.

I was very intrigued from the first time I heard about this book and I preordered it way back in May. I’ve read a lot of contemporary books about mental illnesses and one trope that we see a lot of is the ‘love cures all’ trope. I was interested in Everything Everything because our main character, Maddy, suffers from a physical illness that can’t be magically cured by love. I’ll get into this a little bit more later in my review.

I want to talk about the cover of this book first. I’ve heard so many positive comments about the cover and I didn’t understand why everyone thought it was so beautiful until I had it in my hands and was able to look at it up close. This cover is stunning! The illustrations are so intricate and everything on that cover is related to something that happens in the book (cover illustrations by Good Wives and Warriors). I also have the American hardcover edition and the jacket has that buttery texture. It’s one of the best covers I’ve seen in the last couple of months.

This novel also contains beautiful illustrations throughout it and these are actually done by Nicola Yoon’s husband, David Yoon. I thought the illustrations added a lot to the story and really enhanced it. This book is written in very short chapters, sometimes only a page long, and is filled with notes that Maddy has written, as well as instant message exchanges between characters. I loved the different mediums that were added to the story. I thought it made the book fun and hopeful instead of serious and sad. The little notes and illustrations we got were my favourite part of the book.

So let’s discuss the plot and the themes. In Everything Everything, Maddy has a serious illness that prevents her from doing anything, including going out or even having visitors in her own home. She’s well and alive as long as she’s kept a prisoner in her own home, with only her mother (a physician) and her full-time nurse for company. We actually don’t get very much information about Severe Combined Immunodeficiency (SCID), which is the syndrome that Maddy has that makes her allergic to everything. There were times when I wished we had gotten a bit more information about SCID, just to satisfy my curiosity, but for the most part I was happy to accept the little information that we were given. I also sometimes prefer that books don’t go into a lot of detail and include a lot of jargon because I encounter so many books that misrepresent mental illnesses. So it’s probably better when authors don’t write too much about things they don’t know about.

For me, the last quarter of the book and the plot twist were kind of predictable. It was obvious to me that that was the direction that the plot would take. It’s probably the best way that everything could have turned out, but I almost wished that it had ended differently so things didn’t happen just to make the romance work. It was a bit disappointing that it still ended up being a bit of a ‘love cures all’ type of book. If you’ve read the book, let me know what you think (no spoilers, of course). There were also some things that I found VERY unrealistic, but I don’t want to spoil anyone so I won’t mention what they are.

I really loved watching Maddy grow in this book. She starts off as a pretty passive character but slowly grows into somebody who learns to take risks and experience the unknowns in order to truly be alive, even at the expense of her own life. I loved seeing Maddy appreciate things that I would normally take for granted and I enjoyed seeing the world through Maddy’s eyes as she encountered new things, such as travelling in a car for the first time. I liked her willingness to try new things. There were times when I felt she was being too reckless and it seemed too out of character for her to be risking her life for a few moments of fun. And I also felt that she was a bit inconsistent in her thoughts about whether she’d rather be trapped in a room or dead from doing things that normal people do. Examples below:

I’m on my way home, I’ll remain trapped there forever.

I’m alive, and don’t want to be.

Love can kill you and I’d rather be alive than out there living.

Overall, I really liked Maddy’s character. It was easy to connect with her and read from her point of view. She’s also a book nerd! There were times when I forgot she was 18 because of her innocence. But I loved that she was able to develop and start to take control of her own life. I thought Olly was a great romantic interest for Maddy. He’s very caring and loves his family, and he seemed like the perfect person for Maddy. I did think that their relationship was very insta-lovey and developed too quickly for my liking. It was understandable that Maddy would be drawn to Olly because he’s probably the first teenage boy she’s ever met, but I didn’t understand Olly’s interest in Maddy. They pretty much fell in love without even speaking a single word aloud to each other, and I didn’t think that was very realistic. I still thought they were adorable together and I loved reading about their relationship.

I liked how real the characters felt and that they each had their own issues to deal with. Olly’s father is mentally and physically abusive to his wife and kids, and that added an interesting dynamic to the story. The first half of the book makes a lot of emphasis on the black rubber band that Olly wears and keeps snapping on his wrist. That made me a little bit worried that he was suicidal, because snapping a rubber band against your wrist is a common behaviour that is used as a substitute to cutting. At this point, I was a bit worried about where the story was going to go, but luckily it never went in that direction. There were some mental health elements in the book, but they were never explored very far before the book was over. I do like that the novel had a very open ending. It was a very satisfying and cute ending to the book.

I have many more thoughts about this book but I should probably end it here. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I will probably reread it again in the near future. If you’ve read Everything Everything, let me know if you agree or disagree with any of my thoughts!