Saturday, 23 February 2013

Book Blogger Love-a-Thon: Kick Off and Interview (#LoveAThon)


The Book Blogger Love-a-Thon is being hosted by Katelyn @ Kate's Tales of Books and Bands and Alexa @ Alexa Loves Books from 12am-12am EST today. It's a brilliant event where bloggers get to spend an entire day celebrating everything they love about blogging while connecting with new bloggers and finding great new blogs to follow.

Part of the Love-a-Thon is an interview swap with the awesome Faye @ A Daydreamer's Thoughts :) It's been great getting to know Faye better and the perfect way to kick of the event. So without further ado, here is Faye's inteview:

Name five bloggers who inspire you or who you just love.
Brodie @ Eleusinian Mysteries; Because she supported me from the start, I’ve known her for about eight years now and her blog posts always make me love her a little bit more.
Sarah @ Saz101; Another who supported me at the start when I really needed it, she’s a fun, lovely, and amazing person, and her blog posts are so spectacular that I try not to read them all the time to avoid the pores of jealousy.
Michelle @ Fluttering Butterflies; She’s been doing this for SEVEN years, if that’s not inspiration to every beginner blogger, I don’t know what is. But, on top of that, all of her posts are well-thought out and I love how personal her blog becomes. Oh, and she’s a smashing person herself!
Daphne @ Winged Reviews; Having met her a few times in person, I know that she’s someone I really like talking to and getting to know better, but I also know how hard she works offline and then how much work she also puts into the blog and it’s inspiring to me. Her posts are always really informative and interesting to read as well.
Alexandra @ Alexandra Scribblings; If there was ever an award for a blogger who could write in powerful, alluring, fantastic sentences, it would go to Alexandra, hands down. She always blows me away with her writing and makes me want to jump into her brain to share her most wonderful thoughts! And again, not to mention that she is also just a super lovely and incredible girl too.

Blogging can get tough, what makes you look past that to continue blogging?
It is also fun. It can get tough, especially when I’m busy (like I have been for like, the last month or so) so I struggle to get posts written in time or forget to send important e-mails, etc, but then I remember that when I do get that post written, people will be reading it and some will comment and respond, and I know that all that hard-work and tough parts will all be worth it. Besides, the blogging community is just... there are no words to explain how amazing the community is. They help to make it all worth it. Which is saying a lot as I never thought I would still be blogging almost a year and a half later!

Do you have a favourite genre to read? If so, what is it? If not, what are your top three?
I’m one of those readers that likes variety in my reading, because I’m usually a bit ADHD and need things to keep me interested. I would bawl my eyes out if I had to read the SAME genre over and over again. So choosing just one favourite genre is too difficult for me. So my top three are: Fantasy, Paranormal, and Contemporary.

Are there any books/genres that you feel you will never read?
Historical fiction, for some reason, is a genre that always makes my stomach sink. Not sure what it is about this one but if I hear the words “Set in Elizabethan times, Roman times, Victorian times, etc”, I usually stop reading the synopsis and carry on. I have no idea why because I love history and the few historical fiction books I have read, I absolutely adored. It’s very odd.
But the book I will NEVER read is Fifty Shades of Grey.

What do you love most about blogging?
Without sounding too repetitive, the blogging community is definitely high on my list. Especially now I’ve met so many of the bloggers I’ve come to know at blogging events. Everyone is so friendly and welcoming, and while we have our bits of drama, in general we’re a great bunch of people who all just want to share our love of books with other bookworms. It is the first time I’ve really connected with people over books and that, to me, is just the best thing about it all.

If you could travel back in time to when you started your blog, what piece of advice would you give yourself?
Don’t accept or ask for too many review books! I heard this piece of advice when I was starting out but I was certain it would never be a problem for me. But it turns out it was. It’s so easy to get caught up in the “shiny”new things but a lot of the books I’ve accepted haven’t been great reads, or have arrived along with others, or arrive when it just starts to get busy at work and so my reading and staying on top of it all just fell down the slide a bit. So, if I could stop myself from doing that in the first place, I would.

What are your top five books and why?
This was always going to be the trickiest question! How do I narrow it down to five? Here are five of my favourites, in no particular order.
- Harry Potter Series (Yes, this counts as ONE book)
- Noughts & Crosses Trilogy (See above)
- Divergent by Veronica Roth
- Black Heart Blue by Louisa Reid
- Lucas by Kevin Brooks

If you could live in the world of any book or series (as yourself), which would you pick?
It would make sense to choose a none-threatening series to live within but I think I’m going to have to pick the world in Seraphina by Rachel Hartman simply because the world sounds so fascinating! The idea of dragons and half-dragons is so amazing that I couldn’t not want to live there. I just think it would be so interesting and magical and brilliant. Yes. There is where I’d love to live.
 
 
Typecast

Faye's blog is awesome so I'd definitely recommend visiting. Just click the button on the left to be transported :)

Sunday, 17 February 2013

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon: Wrap Up (#WWReadathon)

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon

I've had a great time this week with the read-a-thon! All in all I read 3 full books with a total of 1328 pages which is pretty good. I also took part in some of the challenges, but I sadly missed both twitter chats :(

The books I read were:

Showcase Sunday (4)


Showcase Sunday is a meme hosted by Vicky @ Books, Biscuits and Tea where you can showcase your newest books and book related swag for that week and share it with everyone.

I've not managed to do a Showcase Sunday for a couple of weeks so I have a bunch of new books to show you :)


Spud and Chloe at the Farm is a book of knitting patterns so you can knit a farm (barn, fences, hay bales, buckets etc) and all the farm animals (sheep, cows, chickens, pigs etc), as well as a doll called Chloe. I'm planning on working through it this year and making a farm for my niece and nephew for Christmas.

Cinnamon Roll Murder is the newest paperback release in Joanne Fluke's Hannah Swensen cozy mystery series. As much as I love the mysteries (and the included cookie recipes) I'm getting really annoyed with the love triangle, when you get to book 15 there really needs to be some kind of resolution. I'm now reaching the end of my patience and may have to give up on the series soon.

I preordered Dance of Shadows after seeing a fair amount of good press for it. The story sounds interesting and the cover is pretty. Now it's arrived I'm very impressed by the animated cover (it works with a free app on your phone), but the constant hype is starting to worry me as I've generally found the more hyped a book is the worse it is.

House Rules is the latest installment in the Chicagoland Vampires series and one I'm really looking forward to. This has been preordered (along with the August release) since last year and I'm super excited to read it as the last book has changed Merit's world a lot.

I popped into Waterstones last week on impulse and found The Indigo Spell sitting on the shelf before its release date! So I quickly cancelled my amazon preorder and snatched up a copy. Of all the books here, this one I read and absoluetely adored. My review will be coming very soon :)

The Indigo Spell was on a buy one, get one half price special so I also picked up a copy of  Seraphina which I've heard great things about. I haven't read any fantasy in ages and I love anything with dragons so I thought I'd give this a try.

I can't believe Sever is out and the Chemical Garden trilogy has come to an end. I loved the first two so I'm looking forward to getting stuck into this and seeing where everyone ends up. I want happy endings for Rhine, Gabriel and Cecily, a horrible end for Vaughn and honestly I'm not bothered by Linden.

Last up is Three Tales from the Sketchbook which I received in a knitting swap. I'm pretty impressed with it, especially as it contains The Legend of Sleepy Hollow which means I'll be able to use this for my Classic Double challenge :)

So what have you got to showcase this week?

Wednesday, 13 February 2013

TBR Pile Mini Challenge: January


I'm taking part in the awesome 2013 Reading Challenge (my sign up post with more details is here) and each month a mini challenge will be posted for even more fun :)

I'm really late in taking part in January's mini challenge! Evie @ Bookish has challenged us to create a book spine poem so here is my entry:


Vampire kisses linger,
unearthly silence
beneath a mountain moon.
 
If you are taking part in the challenge too, you can still take part in the mini challenge for January until February 20th by clicking here.

Tuesday, 12 February 2013

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon: Tuesday (#WWReadathon)

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon

Whenever I do a read-a-thon, I like to post daily updates which end up forming a kind of journal for that time. I'm keeping this tradition with the Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon. Each update will include something about my day and what I've been up to along with my thoughts on the books I've been reading and any challenge entries.

My Day

I'm beginning to think this read-a-thon is cursed. I had set aside most of today and tomorrow to curl up and read but when I went to wash my hair this morning, I found that the electricians have somehow broken the shower casing leaving a big hole right into the electrics. So now today was spent rearranging things and tomorrow is going to be spent getting workmen to fix the mess they've made :(

The Books

I finished reading The Golden Lily and I absolutely loved it! The forbidden romance between Sydney and Adrian pulling her away from the Alchemists. Her struggle between following their rules and being with her friends is heartwrenching, and I love the depth and development of the magic storylines. I definitely prefer Bloodlines to Vampire Academy, and I'm so happy Eddie's story is being continued (hopefully to a happy ending!).


As soon as I finished, I jumped straight into The Indigo Spell. Man am I glad I had this on hand! I've barely stopped reading since I picked it up, and I think I'm setting a record for the number of evil glares at anything that dare disturb me :o Either way I'm only stopping now so I can update here and then I'm straight back into it. I need to know how this all ends up!!! This has all the feels so I have a sinking feeling I'm going to be desperate for book 4 as soon as I close the cover.

Total pages read: 596

The Challenges

Today's challenge is hosted by Alicia @ Book a World and all you need to do to take part is figure out which 2013 YA releases are shown in the snippets and then enter by email. The challenge is open to 9am tomorrow, and you can see the images here.

Monday, 11 February 2013

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon: Monday (#WWReadathon)

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon

Whenever I do a read-a-thon, I like to post daily updates which end up forming a kind of journal for that time. I'm keeping this tradition with the Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon. Each update will include something about my day and what I've been up to along with my thoughts on the books I've been reading and any challenge entries.

My Day

I swear it feels like I'm not getting any reading done during this read-a-thon! We had electricians in this morning to do a safety check which meant lots of making coffee, showing them plug sockets and trying not to go insane from the beeping of the testing machines. I also had to pop to the doctors and it snowed! Only a centimetre or so but enough to look pretty this morning...and then be slushy this afternoon when I was walking about.

The Books

I made the decision after posting yesterday to restart The Golden Lily. I'd read the first three chapters before, but I wanted to start over and read from the beginning in case I'd forgotten anything. I'm loving it! Adrian Ivashkov is easily one of my favourite book characters of all time, and I definitely prefer Sydney to Rose which means I'm enjoying this series more than Vampire Academy.

There are starting to be hints of romance between Sydney and Adrian which is awesome and Adrian's snark and sarcasm to Agent Boring Borscht is hilarious :)

Total pages read: 112

The Challenges

Today's challenge is hosted by Pabkins @ My Shelf Confessions and the rules are pretty simple - the challenge is open to all Wicked Valentine's participants and all you have to do is flip to a random page in your current read. Then read four dice and add the numbers together to give your line/sentence number, and just make that line romantic in some way (using at least 50% from the line). You can still enter here.

The official challenge description is:
My challenge for you today should you choose to bandy words with me: Compile some Lines of Love to woo us, Or perhaps fill us with sadness, make our hearts bleed perhaps? Or nay give us a laugh that only comedic love can.

My current read is The Golden Lily and I rolled a total of 8 and randomly opened the book to page 63 which makes my sentence: "We had no right to manipulate the world like that; it was a hundred times worse than what Sonya had done to the red lily on the street."


My entry is (with quoted words in italics):

We had no right to avoid our feelings as we did, it was a hundred times worse than any punishment on the street: I love you, my beautiful red lily, my world.

Sunday, 10 February 2013

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon: Sunday (#WWReadathon)

Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon

Whenever I do a read-a-thon, I like to post daily updates which end up forming a kind of journal for that time. I'm keeping this tradition with the Wicked Valentine's Read-a-Thon. Each update will include something about my day and what I've been up to along with my thoughts on the books I've been reading and any challenge entries.

My Day

I've been feeling really tired today after yesterday so I've been trying to take it easy, but also helping get the house ready for the electrician who is coming out for a safety check tomorrow. He needs to get at the plug sockets, although some of ours are inaccessible because they're behind really heavy furniture.
 
I also wrote an article for the TM society's newsletter on life as a carer and they're thinking of running it on the front page! I did manage to get some reading done, and I've only really been pausing to answer the reading group questions as I've gotten to each stopping point.

The Books

I've finally finished Deja Dead. All in all, this was an interesting read. The forensic details are fascinating while the the mystery is clever and kept me glued to the page. The storyline is packed with twists and turns and it builds up to an action packed conclusion.

It did take me a while to get into though, as I was a bit thrown by how different this was to Bones but I soon grew to like it. I don't read much crime either so that probably contributed to my struggle to get into it. Once I did though I actually resented having to stop to take part in my book group discussion!

Now I've diving straight back into The Golden Lily as I managed to snag a copy of The Indigo Spell when I was in the city yesterday as Waterstones had it on the shelf! It's not even supposed to be out yet so I snatched up a copy straight away and resisted the urge to happy dance.

I only stopped reading because losing my grandfather triggered a reading rut but now I'm excited and ready to jump straight back in, mostly because of Adrian :)

Total pages read: 277

The Challenges

Today's challenge is hosted by Kimba @ The Caffeinated Book Reviewer, who has invited us to a ball! Her challenge is:
The Ball begins at 7 o'clock sharp and we promise wicked food and entertainment!

For this challenge and to receive your ticket using book covers show us your dress for the ball, your date and how you will arrive.
Here's my dress, date and transport:


For the ball I will be wearing the gorgeous white dress from Rapture and I'll be accompanied by Wren Tigarian. He's a total sweetheart and is drop dead gorgeous to boot. We'll be arriving in a midnight blue 1971 Mustang :)

This challenge runs till 9am Monday and is open to all Wicked Valentine's participants and you can enter here.
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