Book Reviews 2015, Part Three

I kind of don't want to write this post because I'm embarrassed by it. I had a goal at this beginning of this year to read 36 books. While I have met many of my other year-long goals, this one is definitely not going to be met. I'm barely caught up with where I should have been in June. Why? Because I'm lazy, basically. Don't argue with me on this. Reading books, especially books of my genre, is something essential, especially for a writer, and I haven't been doing it, and with very little excuses, too. It's hard to call myself a writer when I know that I rarely read outside of assigned reading for class. I'm definitely going to set the same goal for myself next year, and I will attempt to read a little more for the last three months of the year, and I hope that whatever is keeping me from reading, I can overcome it.

That being said, I did do some reading these past three months, so here are my book reviews for July, August, and September. My three book reviews, for three months.

THE ONE BOOK I READ IN JULY

14. Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
This was a wonderful, wonderful book. I read it in less than a day. It tells the story of Simon, a high school student who loves theater and Harry Potter and has a pretty good social life, except for one thing: he's gay, and he doesn't know how to tell everyone. Also, he has a secret e-mail pen pal guy that he knows goes to his school that he's developing a crush on. So, basically, all the makings of a fun high school drama/romance. It was funny, it was cute, it touched on some serious issues, and, unlike a ton of YA (not that I would know, since I don't read books anymore, apparently), it portrayed teens very accurately. I really liked that- it was just so refreshing. So, I highly recommend it.

THE ONE, SINGULAR, INDIVIDUAL BOOK I READ IN AUGUST

15. Princess Academy: The Forgotten Sisters by Shannon Hale
This was the third and final book in a series I adore, the Princess Academy series. Starting with the Newbery Honor winning Princess Academy, a beautiful book about a mountain girl who learns to read and transforms her village, the series takes the protagonist Miri to the capital of her kindgom, where she participates in a revolution, in the second book. The third book turns the entire premise of the series on its head by introducing three mysterious sisters that Miri is required to tutor in their own personal princess academy. The new setting, the way Miri's character develops, the mystery and the political drama, and of course Shannon Hale's ever amazing writing style, all contributed to a really wonderful book. I'm only sad that there won't be any more books in this series.

THE BOOK THAT STANDS ALONE IN THE DESOLATE ISLAND OF SEPTEMBER

16. Dove Arising by Karen Bao
I was lucky enough to see Karen Bao speak at Ch1Con this August, so I went into her book already having some knowledge about her world-building process and stuff. I guess meeting her as a real human did not prepare me for how good the book would be. To sum it up, it's like if Divergent was way way better and took place on the moon. It's about a girl who joins the moon army to help pay her mother's bail for a political crime, and then realizes the corruption of the moon society. Like everyone, I'm getting a little sick of dystopians (not as if I've been reading that many, but still), but this was a very good one. While the world building was intricate and very well-done, what really drew me in was the character of Phaet, the protagonist. She was unique and incredibly well-developed. The plot kept me on the edge of my seat, as well. I can't wait to see what happens in the next book.

So... yeah. Literally. Three. Books. In three months. What's next? One book in three months? Zero? A couple pages and then giving up? We shall see. Just... please don't, like, be mad at me for calling myself a writer when I read this little. I know, I know how hypocritical it is. I don't even have "writer" in my Twitter bio or anything like that. So I'm just an un-literary college student who wrote some book reviews. Not infringing on the realm of true writers or anything.

I guess this was pretty short... I suppose I can recommend some of the media I actually did consume these past three months. Like... Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish fan fiction, which I've probably read a book's worth of at this point. Actually, on second thought, I won't share any of those. Do you want to hear some of my favorite memes? I don't know. I started watching Steven Universe. Now there's something I can really recommend. The cutest, most wonderful, most whoa-I-came-here-for-the-smol-cutes-what-are-these-feelings? children's cartoon ever.

Seriously, though, if I don't read at least six or seven books over the next three months, I'll just skip the final book review post. Because it's just ridiculous at this point.

Thanks for reading,
Ariel