2021 Reading Resolution & Plans

I know this is a week too late, but I’ve been trying to write this ever since January 1st and I just can’t seem to find the right words to write this blog post. I have a couple of resolutions in mind and have probably told a couple of my bookish friends about it. A couple of days ago, my friend Angele @ Angele Reads Books tagged me to do The New Year’s Resolution Reading Challenge! Just like her, it’s my first book tag here on my blog and I’ve decided to do it along with my personal bookish resolutions. Continue reading

2020 Reads & Stats

Hi, everyone! How are you today? I hope you found some ways to enjoy the holidays this year even when it’s a bit different from the previous years! 2020 has been a very stressful year for us and to cope with all the anxiety this year has brought me, I have turned and relied on my books more than ever. Books have been one of the reasons that I stayed sane through all that has happened. With that being said, 2020 have been a great reading year for me as I managed to do a lot of reading. So today I will be talking about the books I’ve read in 2020 (+ stats):

  1. Why I’m Sending This To You by Iain S. Thomas – ⭐⭐⭐
  2. One You Can’t Forget by Lexy Timms – ⭐⭐⭐
  3. Timeline by Michael Crichton – DNF
  4. The Da Vinci Code _Robert Langdon, #2) by Dan Brown – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  5. Batman: Nightwalker by Marie Lu – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  6. One-Punch Man, Vol. 3 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  7. One-Punch Man, Vol. 4 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  8. Cardcaptor Sakura, Vol. 4 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  9. Cardcaptor Sakura, Vol. 5 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  10. Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler – ⭐⭐⭐
  11. The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  12. The Cheerleaders by Kara Thomas – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  13. Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  14. One-Punch Man, Vol. 5 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  15. This Is How Your Lose Her by Juot Diaz – ⭐⭐⭐
  16. One-Punch Man, Vol. 6 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  17. Kaguya-Sama: Love Is War, Vol. 1 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  18. Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 2 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  19. Beauty and the Beast by Jessica Gunderson – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  20. Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  21. My Riot by Rick Spears – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  22. Dekada ’70 by Lualhati Bautista – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  23. One-Punch Man, Vol. 7 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  24. Ever After by Olivia Vieweg – ⭐⭐
  25. Please Pick Me by Reina Regina – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  26. Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles, #1) by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  27. Magyk (Septimus Heap, #1) by Angie Sage – ⭐⭐⭐
  28. Flyte (Septimus Heap, #2) by Angie Sage – ⭐⭐⭐
  29. The Red Pyramid (Kane Chronicles, #1) by Rick Riordan – ⭐⭐⭐
  30. City of Heavenly Fire (The Mortal Instruments, #6) by Cassandra Clare – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  31. You by Caroline Kepnes – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  32. Wilder Girls by Rory Power – ⭐⭐⭐
  33. Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 3 – ⭐⭐⭐
  34. The Girl On the Train by Paula Hawkins – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  35. The Hunger Games (Hunger Games, #1) by Suzanne Collins – ⭐⭐⭐
  36. Swimming Lessons: Poems by Lili Reinhart – ⭐⭐⭐
  37. Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  38. One-Punch Man, Vol. 8 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
  39. Becoming by Michelle Obama – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  40. The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey – ⭐⭐⭐
  41. The Poppy War (Poppy War, #1) by R.F. Kuang – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
  42. Slasher Girls & Monster Boys – ⭐⭐⭐
  43. There’s Someone Inside Your House by Stephanie Perkins – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
    Continue reading

End of the Year in Books

Hi, everyone! We’re now down to the last month of the year and, wow, did time fly way too fast. At this point, I’m not even sure if that’s a good thing because it sure felt like I’ve lost a year of my life at home. Haha But despite this year being a pain in the arse, it sure as heck been one of the greatest reading year I’ve had since 2017. 2017 was a very challenging year for me, and one thing I realized now is that I do turn to books for comfort whenever life becomes too hard for me to bear.

So today, I’m doing the End of the Year Book Tag which I’ve been seeing around the booktube community and saw that one of my bookish friends here in the internet did it on her blog, too. I remember doing a similar post to this one at the first half of the year, so I decided to do it now, too: Continue reading

Book Review: Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell & Faith Erin Hicks

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Title: Pumpkinheads 

Author: Rainbow Rowell, Faith Erin Hicks

Publication Date: August 27, 2019

Number of Pages: 211

Publisher: First Second

Genre: YA, Graphic Novel, Contemporary, Romance

Synopsis:

Deja and Josiah are seasonal best friends.

Every autumn, all through high school, they’ve worked together at the best pumpkin patch in the whole wide world. (Not many people know that the best pumpkin patch in the whole wide world is in Omaha, Nebraska, but it definitely is.) They say good-bye every Halloween, and they’re reunited every September 1.

But this Halloween is different—Josiah and Deja are finally seniors, and this is their last season at the pumpkin patch. Their last shift together. Their last good-bye.

Josiah’s ready to spend the whole night feeling melancholy about it. Deja isn’t ready to let him. She’s got a plan: What if—instead of moping and the usual slinging lima beans down at the Succotash Hut—they went out with a bang? They could see all the sights! Taste all the snacks! And Josiah could finally talk to that cute girl he’s been mooning over for three years.

What if their last shift was an adventure?

Continue reading

Book Talk: Mass Market Paperbacks

Hi, everyone! Today I’m introducing a new segment on my blog for bookish discussions. It’s been on my mind for a while now and have been thinking of topics to talk about for my pilot post. I recently got a job promotion, so what better way to reward myself than to buy new books, right? I bought five on-hand books and preordered three others, three of the on-hand books that I bought are in mass market paperback formats. So I thought of talking about mass market paperbacks on my blog as there have always been some discussion about it going around the community.

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To be perfectly honest, I’m not a big fan of mass market paperbacks myself. They aren’t my type of book format not only because their spines break so easily but also because the font is smaller compared to trade paperbacks and hardbacks. I wear glasses and have astigmatism, so I find it a little bit hard to read from this format especially when it comes to fantasy series chunkers!

Regardless, I still do have quite a number of mass market paperbacks on my book collection — mostly standalone thrillers, romance, and suspense books. What I like most about this format, though, is that it’s lightweight and handy so it’s easy to bring them during travels and overnights — basically, anywhere! It’s also much cheaper than other formats. Also, most of my Nicholas Sparks books are in this format because back in the day, I can only find mass market paperback versions of his works in my country. It was only just a couple of years ago when my local bookstores started selling out other formats of his novels — this is also similar to other authors like Dan Brown, Gillian Flynn, James Patterson, etc.

I also prefer mass market paperback format more than e-books as they tend to strain my eyes easily given that I am already required to sit in front of the computer 8 hours a day for work.

How about you? What are your thoughts on MMPBs?

Stuff I’ve Been Reading Lately #12

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BOOKS READ:

  • Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles, #1) by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
  • Please Pick Me by Reina Regina
  • One-Punch Man Vol 8 by ONE
  • Cardcaptor Sakura Vol. 5 by CLAMP

BOOKS BOUGHT:

  • An Enchantment of Ravens by Margaret Rogerson
  • Crown of Feathers by Nicki Pau Preto
  • Loveboat, Taipei by Abigail Hing Wen
  • Wilder Girls by Rory Power
  • Wink, Poppy, Midnight by April Genevieve Tucholke
  • Dragon Republic (Poppy War, #2) by R.F. Kuang
  • See You in the Cosmos by Jack Cheng
  • The Keep of Lost Cities (Keeper of Lost Cities, #1) by Shannon Messenger
  • Exile (Keeper of Lost Cities, #2) by Shannon Messenger
  • The Final Empire (Mistborn, #1) by Brandon Sanders
  • The Well of Ascension (Mistborn, #2) by Brandon Sanderson
  • The Hero of Ages (Mistborn, #3) by Brandon Sanderson

ARC/s:

  • Please Pick Me by Reina Regina

Continue reading

Book Review: [ARC] Please Pick Me by Reina Regina

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Title: Please Pick Me

Author: Reina Regina

Publication Date: November 11, 2020

Number of Pages: 124

Publisher: Moonchild Press Publishing

Genre: Poetry

Synopsis:

In a garden of a thousand other volumes, my little yellow book with its earnest plea and hopeful flowers on the cover sits waiting for you to pick it up. It’s got a heart it wants to give away.

These haikus, poems, and prose pieces are about

the miracle of being wanted back by someone we want,
the desperation of hoping they’ll fight harder when they waver,
the rawness of seeking reassurance that we are loved as we are, and
the tenderness we feel when we’re sending love out to others

—all those moments when we are making our need to be accepted plain and praying, please pick me.

This book was born after twenty-six years of learning that it’s okay to want to be wanted, that vulnerability is merely throwing open the gateway to honest connections, and that fighting to be loved the way you deserve is bravery and not weakness.

I hope you open it. I hope it invites you to be open too.

Continue reading

Favorite Debut Books

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Hey, guys! Today I’m going to talk about my all-time favorite debuts! I’ve been wanting to write posts of my favorite so and so and I have already started in February and sort of stopped because I ran out of ideas of books to list. Recently, I came up with a lot of ideas for my blog content and have been scheduling posts since last week. With that, I also came up with new topics for my book lists!

If you do not know, a debut book means it is an author’s first novel that has been published. I honestly love reading debut novels and discovering amazing authors, I mean, if the first novel they ever wrote is amazing, what more the next books that they will write, right?

Continue reading

Tier-Ranking All the Contemporary Books I’ve Ever Read

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Hi, everyone! I’m back with another book list (sort of). Since I’ve been seeing a lot of people in the book community tier-ranking the books that they’ve read, I decided to do one for all the contemporary book that I have ever read. Continue reading

Book Review: Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

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Title: Sharp Objects

Author: Gillian Flynn

Date Published: September 26, 2006

Number of Pages: 396

Publisher: Crown Publishing Book

Genre: Mystery, Thriller

Synopsis:

Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, reporter Camille Preaker faces a troubling assignment: she must return to her tiny hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls. For years, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows: a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed in her old bedroom in her family’s Victorian mansion, Camille finds herself identifying with the young victims—a bit too strongly. Dogged by her own demons, she must unravel the psychological puzzle of her own past if she wants to get the story—and survive this homecoming. Continue reading