Series Review | To All the Boys I've Loved Before trilogy, Jenny Han

                            

Hello, guys! And welcome to this series review. This time it's turn for the known contemporary, YA trilogy by Jenny Han, To All the Boys I've Loved Before trilogy. It was originally going to be a standalone, then a duology, and finally it's come to be a trilogy. It says in the acknowledgments of the third book that there will be no more books in this series, so that's as far as Lara Jean's story gets. I've reviewed both To All the Books I've Loved Before and P.S. I Still Love You in the past, so I thought it would be nice to review the last book in the series (Always and Forever Lara Jean) in relation to the previous two - what is commonly called a Book Series Review, right? I guess?

The series follows a teenage girl named Lara Jean who comes from a multi-racial family - her mum has a Corean origin and her dad is a white American. Lara Jean has a habit of writing letters to the boys she loved once she stops loving them, but she never sends them. One day, the letters get mysteriously sent out to the boys, who one by one come to her to ask for an explanation she doesn't want to give.

Cova Reviews | Two Boys Kissing, by David Levithan | 2017 Diverse Reads Challenge

Hello, everybody! As you may know from my previous posts, I haven't been doing well about the 2017 Diverse Reads Challenge - I had a very detailed plan, but I haven't managed to follow it through so far, so I am a few months behind schedule. Two Boys Kissing, by David Levithan is the book I was meant to read in July, but because I swapped the book I planned to read for the month of June to a different one, and the topic was the same for both June and July, I ended up reading it for the month of June (although I read it in July). I am getting back on track, though. When this post goes live I will probably have read the book for the month of July as well (and maybe even August, who knows :P).

Anyway, Two Boys Kissing is a contemporary YA about homosexuality, about transsexualism, about finding oneself, about love, about friendship, about achieving one's goals, ... This book covers so many important topics it's hard not to tell people to read it just for that. But let's see what else it has to offer ;)

In case you haven't noticed, the topic for the month of June was:

Sexuality and Gender Identity

"New York Times  bestselling author David Levithan tells the based-on-true-events story of Harry and Craig, two 17-year-olds who are about to take part in a 32-hour marathon of kissing to set a new Guinness World Record—all of which is narrated by a Greek Chorus of the generation of gay men lost to AIDS. 
While the two increasingly dehydrated and sleep-deprived boys are locking lips, they become a focal point in the lives of other teen boys dealing with languishing long-term relationships, coming out, navigating gender identity, and falling deeper into the digital rabbit hole of gay hookup sites—all while the kissing former couple tries to figure out their own feelings for each other." (Goodreads)

Cova Reviews | Salt to the Sea, by Ruta Sepetys

Hello everyone! It's time for a new book review :) You'd be rare if you didn't already know about Ruta Sepetys' multiple award-winning young adult, historical fiction novel Salt to the Sea. At least, if you frequent the page Goodreads, you'll know it won last year's (2016) Goodreads Choice Award for young Adult Fiction. It had such a good reception I had to read it! Moreover, I listened to it on audiobook -thus it contributes to the 2017 Audiobook Challenge I am taking part in!

"Winter, 1945. Four teenagers. Four secrets.
Each one born of a different homeland; each one hunted, and haunted, by tragedy, lies…and war.
As thousands of desperate refugees flock to the coast in the midst of a Soviet advance, four paths converge, vying for passage aboard the Wilhelm Gustloff, a ship that promises safety and freedom.
Yet not all promises can be kept.
Inspired by the single greatest tragedy in maritime history, bestselling and award-winning author Ruta Sepetys (Between Shades of Gray) lifts the veil on a shockingly little-known casualty of World War II. An illuminating and life-affirming tale of heart and hope." (Goodreads)

Cova Reviews | The Hereafter, by Jessica Bucher

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book for review via NetGalley. This does not in any away affect the truthfulness of the following statement, which reflects my honest opinion on the novel

Hello, everyone! Today I bring to you a review of the book The Hereafter, by Jessica Bucher. It is a great new adult, paranormal novel, a stand-alone (at least, so far) about death, love, faith and consequences.  I was lucky enough to be granted this book for review, and I am so happy I was! It was published independently by the author, and it honestly changed my mind about self-published works. It came out last month, March 16th.

"Nin has no recollection of her death. The things she does remember, like her cruel boyfriend, troubled father, and absent mother, she’d like to forget. Dylan doesn’t need to remember his death to know that he deserved it. Who needs memories when you have the scars? Sparks ignite when the two, very different, strangers meet. Together they spend one endless summer exploring their new world. Suddenly, their after-lives hold more possibility and promise than their tragic teenage lives ever did.But no dream lasts forever, and all too soon, harmful memories from their pasts emerge and threaten to tear them apart. Given the chance to change their fates, Nin and Dylan must decide-- life or love.Weaving through past and present and alternating perspectives, The Hereafter is an emotional journey about young love and second chances." (Goodreads)

Cova Reviews | A Monster Calls, by Patrick Ness

Well, well, well. Now, what do we have here? A Monster Calls has been all over the media for quite a while now -especially now that the film has come out. I have been wanting to pick it up since before I even knew there was going to be a movie based on it, and around one week after I bought the book, a friend of mine came to me and said "You know what, Cova? I went to the cinema yesterday and watched A Monster Calls, and you want to know something? The monster is ****************". I almost died right there and then... I could kill him!! He'd spoiled a story that I had been wanting to get to for so long!! Luckily, he was just being an asshole and that had absolutely nothing to do with the story :D I did not have a good time, though!

We could say A Monster Calls is a fantasy book about loss, hope and growing up. I honestly did not know what it was about when I read it, and that went extremely well for me, so I'm just going to leave you here the synopsis from Goodreads:

"The monster showed up after midnight. As they do.

But it isn’t the monster Conor’s been expecting. He’s been expecting the one from his nightmare, the one he’s had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments, the one with the darkness and the wind and the screaming…

This monster is something different, though. Something ancient, something wild. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor.

It wants the truth." (Goodreads)

Cova Reviews | p53. The Gene that Cracked the Cancer Code (Sue Armstrong)

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know I was assigned to read p53 The Gene that Cracked the Cancer Code (by Sue Armstrong) at the start of the semester for a voluntary assignment. I actually thought it was a very nice assignment -extra marks for reading a book, what's not to like?! :D 

Essentially, it is the story about the discovery of p53 -a gene that was found to be the key to knowing what cancer is, and how it makes your cells go crazy (it's non-fiction, of course). Shockingly enough, we've only discovered this recently, and so much work has been put into it. p53 also gives you a tour around what the scientific method is (how experiments occur -how they are planned, carried out and eventually understood), which I think is a great topic -too many times we take science for granted when really so many people are working for the world to understand! (hey, med student right here :P).

May/June Bookhaul :D

Hello there! As you probably figured out by the title already, I bought and received quite a large amount of books recently - so that I decided to write a whole new post about it. Some I've read already, some are still in my TBR list. Whatever I know about each of them, I will tell you :) 

The Lake House, by Kate Morton

 

Well then, so this one is a different type of read from the ones I'm used to, but I certainly did enjoy it nonetheless :) The Lake House is a Historical Fiction, mystery novel set in England in different timesets between the 1910s and 2004.

"An abandoned house...
June 1933, and sixteen-year-old Alice Edevane is preparing for her family's Midsummer Eve party at their country home, Loeanneth. But by the time midnight strikes and fireworks light up the night skies, the Edevane family will have suffered a loss so great that they leave Loeanneth forever.

A missing child...
Seventy years later, after a particularly troubling case, Detective Sadie Sparrow retreats to her beloved grandfather's cottage in Cornwall. Once there, she stumbles upon an abandoned house, and learns the story of a baby boy who disappeared without a trace.

An unsolved mystery...
Meanwhile, in her elegant Hampstead home, the formidable Alice Edevane, now an old lady, leads a life as neatly plotted as the bestselling detective novels she writes. Until a young police detective starts asking questions about her family's past, seeking to resurrect the complex tangle of secrets Alice has spent her life trying to escape..." (Goodreads)