2017 Audiobook Challenge Semi-Annual Update

Hello everyone! It's June already, which means it is time to look back at the reads you've completed so far in 2017 and be amazed by how well (of course 😎) you've done on all you bookish challenges! 

As you might know, I discovered audiobooks around two years ago now, and I've loved listening to them ever since. I listen to books when I do chores and when I go walking to places, mainly, and I think it's a great way to both read more and to use your time wisely. This year I've surpassed my expectations for the number of audiobooks I've listened to - in fact, more than 40% of the books I've read so far this year are in audiobook format. For the 2017 Audiobook Challenge (hosted by Hot Listens and Caffeinated Book Reviewer), I chose to do the Weekend Warrior level (5-10 audiobooks, specifically setting myself the target of 6 audiobooks), and I've already listened to 5 audiobooks from January to June!

Here is my semi-annual update! 

Note: the cover pictures in this post are linked to their respective Goodreads page

Famous Books I HAVE NOT read

Hello there! I thought this week's post will be about books that everyone is constantly talking about but that I -forever behind-, have not yet read. For some reason or another, I always find myself years behind in the book community! Just so you can have an idea, I just read All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr last month - and it was super hyped in 2015! I keep hoping I will catch up someday, but until that moment comes, here's a short recollection of those books :)

Beware - there are some shocking ones!

1. The Book Thief (Markus Zusak)

Why have I not read this book? Honestly, no idea. I guess it is because I never actually owned it and I am waiting to get my hands on a pretty copy. I really do want to read it, though I have to admit I have the faintest idea of what it is about. I didn't go see the movie because I wanted to read it first, but I guess I never got the chance... :/ I will definitely read it as soon as I get myself a copy :D

Cova Reviews | The Retribution of Mara Dyer (Mara Dyer #3) - Michelle Hodkin

Hey there! Today I am going to review for you book number three in the Mara Dyer trilogy by Michelle Hodkin - The Retribution of Mara Dyer. If you haven't read the first two books, I recommend you read their reviews first, even though this will be a non-spoiler review regarding all three books in the series. You can find the review of the first book here, and the second here.

This book I listened to on audiobook, therefore it added up to the list of books I listened to for my 2016 Audiobook Challenge, in which I ended up doing pretty good! :D I think once again Christy Romano did a very good job narrating this book -her interpretation of Mara is pretty good. However, once more, I didn't at all like the accent with which she tries to sound like British Noah - as I said in the review for The Evolution of Mara Dyer, that makes him sound really fake and not at all like I imagined when I read the first book of the series (which I didn't listen to on audiobook). Other than that, her way of reading is perfect for the different scenes and I really enjoyed listening to the book over all :D

Challenges I will smash in 2017

Hello again! First post of the year! :D Isn't it so exciting? 

I've decided to write a blog post this random day of the week to share with you the challenges I am joining this year. Last year I joined the 2016 Audiobook Challenge, and the 2016 Finishing the Series Challenge. This year, there will be some changes :) 

4 Tips to Help You Read More Books

Hello everyone! Today I thought of writing a different type of blog post for you to read. 

As those of you who have seen my blogger profile may know, I am currently doing my first year of university. I am taking a particularly time-consuming course, and therefore sadly I am not able to read as much as I would like during the school year :(

However I have found a few habits that have helped me out in my reading task. I hope you find them useful too!

Fangirl - Rainbow Rowell

Hello everyone :) Today I bring to you Fangirl - a young adult, contemporary novel written by Rainbow Rowell - a book which so many people are talking about. 

Honestly, I had seen Fangirl in bookshops so many times before, but I did not bring myself to buying it until quite recently after I read and watched so many good reviews about it. It is nothing like what I thought it was going to be. It is the first novel I read from the author, and I am really happy I did.

"A coming-of-age tale of fan fiction, family and first love. 
Cath is a Simon Snow fan.
Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan...
But for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving.
Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.
Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.
Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words... And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.
For Cath, the question is: Can she do this?
Can she make it without Wren holding her hand? Is she ready to start living her own life? Writing her own stories?
And does she even want to move on if it means leaving Simon Snow behind?" (Goodreads)

Thirteen Reasons Why - Jay Asher

Thirteen Reasons Why is a Young Adult, fiction novel which tells us the story about a guy, Clay Jensen, who randomly receives a box with his name on it in which he finds seven double-sided tapes recorded by his deceased friend Hannah Baker, explaining the 13 reasons why she decided to commit suicide. Only those people who made the list will ever listen to the tapes, which leaves us with one single question - what did Clay do to be in the list?

I found this book absolutely refreshing. The story is just so original and creative, and the flow of the story is very good. This is the first book I ever decided to listen to on audiobook, and I think I made such a good choice! I wasn't really sure about listening to something you are meant to read, but if you ever think about trying it out, this book definitely is the right one to do so because the story is mainly the tapes of Hannah Baker explaining her story, so I literally felt as if I was listening to the tapes. Moreover this audiobook has two different voices - a male one for the part narrated by Clay and a female one for Hannah Baker's tapes, which I think is a brilliant idea. The audiobook definitely got a 5/5 from me. If you ever have the chance, please try it out. 

Red Queen - Victoria Aveyard

Red Queen, by Victoria Aveyard is the first book of a young adult, fantasy series with the same name about a world in which there are two kinds of people - those whose blood has a red colour and those whose blood has a silver colour. The Silvers have special abilities which enables them overpower the Reds, who live in very bad conditions and tend to hate the Silvers. Our main character, Mare, is a Red, destined to serve the military in her next birthday, but her story is much more complicated than that...

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - Benjamin Alire Sáenz

When I first heard of this book, I was a bit cautious with it because I thought the title implied it being a middle-school read which I wouldn't enjoy as much. However, I heard and read so many good reviews on it that I changed my mind about it, and decided to buy it. Here's what I thought about it.

First of all, let me please tell you that if you are thinking that maybe you'd like to read it, don't rely on the back-cover insight to the story. It's pretty poor, and it will make you think of it as a boring on, which is not.

It is about two 15-year-old boys, Ari and Dante, who don't really have many friends, and find each other at the town's swimming pool. From that moment on, they become really good friends, and you'll start knowing more about the two of them as the story goes on - as will them, really.

100 followers on Twitter & Thoughts on the Fifty Shades Trilogy - E.L. James

WE'VE REACHED 100 FOLLOWERS ON TWITTER!!

I just checked the page's Twitter account and discovered that there is already 100 of you following @W_Literature!! I am so grateful to you all, and to celebrate this fantastic achievement, I've decided to do a post of some very famous pieces of literature. 

Here's to reading!

So I read this ultimately famous erotic series at the very start of the summer, and as I recently saw someone's review of the books, I figured I would do the same, just to let you know what my thoughts were. It is a very polemic series, and without further ado, let's get started!

First of all, I will admit that I had no idea what the books were about before I started reading the first one, Fifty Shades of Grey. I just wanted to know what was it that attracted millions and millions of readers, and if the books were actually any good. So let me start by explaining a bit what the story behind the whole erotic thing is about. 

Senior college student Anastasia Steele steps in for her sick roommate to interview the owner of one of the most successful companies in the world, Christian Grey, for an article for the college newspaper. She is clumsy and shy, and hardly had any relationships in her whole life, but still something makes the billionaire feel surprisingly attracted to her, and soon she sees him everywhere. What she doesn't know is that the mysterious, utterly handsome businessman has some quite difficult and unusual habits with the girls he meets. 

Before I Go to Sleep - S.J. Watson

I did not know of this book before I found it in a bookstore at Dubai's airport, and I chose it because the story really intrigued me - I thought "how is it possible to write a story where the protagonists does not remember what has been written before?", and I have to say S.J. Watson completely nailed it. She does it in such a smooth manner that you don't even realise what she's doing to you until she's already done it, and it's too late and you're dead right there with the book in your hands. This book completely blew my mind! 

I will just write what comes on the back cover of the book, because it is what I read before I started reading the whole book, which worked just fine for me:

Memories define us

What if you lost yours every time you went to sleep?

Your name, your identity, your past, even the people you love - all forgotten over night.

And the one person you trust may only be telling you half the story.

Welcome to Christine's life.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs

I read this book a couple of months ago and I really, really enjoyed it. It was, indeed, quite peculiar  itself. 

It is about a boy, Jacob Portman, who convinces his parents to let him travel to Wales (The UK) in order to learn about the truthfulness of his grandfather's stories -- who has recently died in what seems to Jacob some very strange circumstances. The old man used to tell him stories about his notoriously exceptional adventures with some really strange friends of his in an orphanage for war refugee children when he was little. At some point he stopped believing them, but he's not so sure they're not true anymore...

I have to say I bought this book for its appealing title and wonderful cover, but it definitely did not let me down. I found the story very new and original, and I surely did not expect what was coming. I think the characters are very interesting -- the main one is quite strongly developed while the rest are not a much, though I believe it was made on purpose, so nicely done (no spoilers, you'll see!). 

The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins

The Girl on the Train is a psychological thriller set in London and its outskirts. It is bestseller book, so I thought I would give it a try and see what I thought myself.

It is narrated from three different perspectives, thought only one of them belongs to the protagonist - Rachel. She got divorced some years back because of a drinking problem that she developed, which she still has not overcome. Everyday, she takes the same train to go to London and back, even though she also lost her job a couple of months ago because of the same problem. While in the train, every time she observes the houses she passes by, though there's two in particular that she is interested in: her old house, where she used to live with Tom (her ex-husband) and where the latter still lives with her new wife; and one on the same street where a couple that seems perfect to Rachel lives. One day, the woman in the perfect couple disappears. 

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender - Lesley Walton

Simply wonderful.

To my great misfortune, I was once mistaken for an angel

I am completely destroyed by the effect this book had on me. As a quick description, I will just say it is such a beautiful story, so beautifully written. 

"Magical realism, lyrical prose, and the pain and passion of human love haunt this hypnotic generational saga.
Foolish love appears to be the Roux family birthright, an ominous forecast for its most recent progeny, Ava Lavender. Ava—in all other ways a normal girl—is born with the wings of a bird.
In a quest to understand her peculiar disposition and a growing desire to fit in with her peers, sixteen-year old Ava ventures into the wider world, ill-prepared for what she might discover and naïve to the twisted motives of others. Others like the pious Nathaniel Sorrows, who mistakes Ava for an angel and whose obsession with her grows until the night of the Summer Solstice celebration.
That night, the skies open up, rain and feathers fill the air, and Ava’s quest and her family’s saga build to a devastating crescendo.First-time author Leslye Walton has constructed a layered and unforgettable mythology of what it means to be born with hearts that are tragically, exquisitely human." (Goodreads)

Cova Reviews | Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green and David Levithan

Will Grayson, Will Grayson tells the story of two guys who have the same name - there are two guys called Will Grayson living nearby. They do not know each other, and their lives are pretty different: one of them has a stable family, with two surgeon parents and a gay best friend; the other Will Grayson lives with his mum, needs pills for his mental health issues, does not want any friends and has a big secret. Eventually their lives intertwine in the most unexpected circumstances. Will Grayson, Will Grayson is a book about love, friendship and finding one's sexuality.

As you have probably already noticed, it is written by two different authors, who have tremendously different writing styles. They write alternate chapters, each of which is about a different Will Grayson. This means that each author writes only about one of the Graysons, following the order Green, Levithan, Green, Levithan... This makes the book and the characters so much richer, because the writing of the authors is as different as the two main characters, shown through the 1st person narration. 

Hello first readers!

I have just started this blog today, after a long period of hibernation from my blog on other platforms. I just thought that maybe having a fresh start would motivate me to write more about the things that I like - a.k.a books! 

This blog is going to hold reviews from the books I read, no matter how much I like them - that way you who are reading this can be sure that what I write is solely my own opinion about a particular book. The aim of this page is not only to help other people who might be interested in learning what the general public things about a novel they think they might like, but also to create something like a little journal for myself to read in a few years time and remember all those amazing stories I devoted my hours to.

So just for you to learn a bit about how this is going to work, let's just say that I will write a brief synopsis of the book, followed by a written opinion and highlights of what I have loved and what I haven't quite of the book. All this will be culminated by a rating on a scale from 1 to 5, where 1 is very bad and 5 is absolutely amazing. Hopefully we will encounter many more of the latter in this magnificent adventure! 

One more thing, don't expect regular uploads of reviews, because you won't find them here. When I finish a book, I will write a review. Some weeks, I may finish three books, but some others I won't even finish one. That's just how it is!

Lastly, the only thing left to do is to wish you all a Wonderful Reading. Hope to see many of you guys around!

See you soon, Wonderful People!

wonderful literature.