January 3 In 1

This months 3 in 1 and also my first 3 in 1 topic is author's you've not read anything by yet but want to in 2017. The 3 in 1 series was started in a Goodreads group called Booktubers from around the world by Cherrie Walker. 

Goodreads Group → https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/195015-booktubers-from-around-the-world

1. Rainbow Rowell

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell has been on my To - Be Read list for the past year and to be honest I don't know what I've been waiting for to pick this up. I think kicking off my Rainbow Rowell reading venture with Fangirl would be a wonderful entrance into her writing. I've heard great things about this author and all of her books so, hopefully I will get the chance to see what all the fuss is about.

Goodreads ⇨ https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4208569.Rainbow_Rowell

 2. Colleen Hoover

I don't usually read too much contemporary but I have heard amazing things about this author as well. From this author I really want to read November 9, Ugly Love, Never Never, and Confess. I'm not sure if I will get to all of them this year but I would like to get to at least one of them to get a taste of the type of author she is. Only time will tell!

Goodreads ⇨ https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5430144.Colleen_Hoover

3. Sarah J. Maas

And last but not least, Sarah J. Maas has been on my To-Be-Read list ever since I heard about the Throne of Glass series but what really made me more interested in reading from her was the release of her A Court of Thorns and Roses series. Not only do I love fairy tale retelling but with Beauty and the Beast also being one of my favorite fairy tales I just know I can't resist reading from her this year. I would like to at least read the first books in both of her series. 

Goodreads ⇨  https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3433047.Sarah_J_Maas

How I Rate Books

★★★★★: I absolutely LOVED it!!! I 100% recommend it
★★★★: I liked it but something was missing or something small bothered me
★★★: It was ok, but it fell short of it's true potential
★★: Needs work, I wouldn't recommend it
★: HATED it

My Not So Perfect Life By: Sophie Kinsella

Description:

Part love story, part workplace dramedy, part witty critique of the false judgments we make in a social-media-obsessed world, this is New York Times bestselling author Sophie Kinsella’s most timely and sharply observed novel yet.

Everywhere Katie Brenner looks, someone else is living the life she longs for, particularly her boss, Demeter Farlowe. Demeter is brilliant and creative, lives with her perfect family in a posh townhouse, and wears the coolest clothes. Katie’s life, meanwhile, is a daily struggle—from her dismal rental to her oddball flatmates to the tense office politics she’s trying to negotiate. The final, demeaning straw comes when Demeter makes Katie dye her roots in the office. No wonder Katie takes refuge in not-quite-true Instagram posts, especially as she’s desperate to make her dad proud.

Then, just as she’s finding her feet—not to mention a possible new romance—the worst happens. Demeter fires Katie. Shattered but determined to stay positive, Katie retreats to her family’s farm in Somerset to help them set up a vacation business. London has never seemed so far away—until Demeter unexpectedly turns up as a guest. Secrets are spilled and relationships rejiggered, and as the stakes for Katie’s future get higher, she must question her own assumptions about what makes for a truly meaningful life.

Sophie Kinsella is celebrated for her vibrant, relatable characters and her great storytelling gifts. Now she returns with all of the wit, warmth, and wisdom that are the hallmarks of her bestsellers to spin this fresh, modern story about presenting the perfect life when the reality is far from the image.

Publishing Co.: Random House Publishing - The Dial Press
Release Date: Feb. 7, 2017
Date Started: Jan. 14, 2017

Date Completed: Jan. 22, 2017

Rating: ★★★★★

Review:

     I requested and received this advanced reader copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review. Seeing that this was my first ever Sophie Kinsella read I absolutely adored this, and I don't usually read from the Contemporary genre but I've just heard so many good things about this author I had to see for myself what all the hype was about and I was not at all disappointed!

     Character wise, Katie to me was struggling with some identity issues by trying to mold herself into the "perfect" person but at the same time trying to run away from and hide who she truly was. While I was reading from her the phrase "The grass isn't always greener on the other side" came to mind. Demeter, Katie's boss, strikes me as this person whose life could seem so perfect on the outside, might not be so perfect on the inside. I can definitely see why everyone hated Demeter but also how they could be misunderstanding her, too. Sure she is definitely bitchy but that can also be confused with her being a perfectionist and competitive over her job title.

Overall, the office drama as well as her personal life drama was going haywire and I loved it so much to the point where I actually caught myself laughing out loud at moments. I loved the internal monologue I was presented with, It felt so real as if I was really reading Katie's mind first hand but also it was really entertaining. I also loved how every character was introduced to me, it wasn't too brief but it didn't drag on too long either. I was so relieved and thankful for how Katie's love-life-relationships were handled as well as her family relationships. I was overjoyed that there was not an instant love connection nor an old flame rekindling session.

The only thing that I found just a bit annoying was how much the word "loo" was used but that's just not MY normal dialect so it's not something that at all drastically changed my opinion of the book.

I was very happy and satisfied with the ending and all in all, this book left me off with a smile on my face. I think this would be a really good recommended read for anyone looking for something quick and entertaining but also for anyone looking to enter into the Contemporary world.

Cinder By: Marissa Meyer (Lunar Chronicles Bk. 1)

Description:

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl.

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Date Started: Jan. 3, 2017

Date Completed: Jan . 14, 2017

Rating: ★★★★★

Characters:

     I always try to visualize the characters in my head while I'm reading a book and the visuals of the characters in this book was inspired by Jenny from My Life as a Teenage Robot, I-Robot, a little bit of Cyborg from Teen Titans. Seeing that I didn't really care for the original Cinderella to begin with because I don't like push overs, I absolutely loved the new and improved version of her. I loved the mysteriousness surrounding Cinder's past and she just had this spiciness and spunk about herself that made it hard to dislike her. The level of realness that she had with herself was well appreciated because it's not a quality you get very often in many characters. 

      I really liked that in this version of the "fairy tale" the two step sisters had two totally different personalities, unlike the original story where they were pretty much the exact same person.

      Prince Kai reminds me a little of Elias from An Ember in the Ashes By Sabaa Tahir. His strong willed personality just swept me away and I love that aspect in a male character.

     The only issue I have, character wise, is I wish the stepmother's character, Adi, had a nastier personality. From my point of view, her character was a little under developed when it came to the fact that she was supposed to be an evil and mean stepmother. I just felt that a little more work could have been put into her character's personality and actions to make her into that hateful character we
all know she should have and could have been.

Overall:

     I loved the overall plot of this book, I never had a dull moment. I felt like I was always on the tip of my toes, craving what would happen next. The story building was absolutely amazing, nothing was obvious; I felt that I caught on to certain plot points exactly when I was meant to and not a moment sooner. I just felt giddy and excited the whole way through. 

     The world building was also something I love to see in fantasy and sci-fi books. The mix between old world and futuristic world is one of my favorite settings to see and reminds me a lot of my favorite book Red Queen.

     I also really liked having the race against time with the letumosis disease. It added something extra for us to worry about besides the actual characters we already had to worry about.

     I recommend this read to everyone, especially fans of retellings, because this one will knock your socks off and make you wonder why this is not the original background of Cinderella. I can't wait to continue this series and see what other treats I am in store for. 

Sugar By: Deirdre Riordan Hall

Description:

I’m the fat Puerto Rican–Polish girl who doesn’t feel like she belongs in her skin, or anywhere else for that matter. I’ve always been too much and yet not enough.

Sugar Legowski-Gracia wasn’t always fat, but fat is what she is now at age seventeen. Not as fat as her mama, who is so big she hasn’t gotten out of bed in months. Not as heavy as her brother, Skunk, who has more meanness in him than fat, which is saying something. But she’s large enough to be the object of ridicule wherever she is: at the grocery store, walking down the street, at school. Sugar’s life is dictated by taking care of Mama in their run-down home—cooking, shopping, and, well, eating. A lot of eating, which Sugar hates as much as she loves.

When Sugar meets Even (not Evan—his nearly illiterate father misspelled his name on the birth certificate), she has the new experience of someone seeing her and not her body. As their unlikely friendship builds, Sugar allows herself to think about the future for the first time, a future not weighed down by her body or her mother.

Soon Sugar will have to decide whether to become the girl that Even helps her see within herself or to sink into the darkness of the skin-deep role her family and her life have created for her.

Date Started: Dec. 21, 2016
Date Completed: Jan. 3, 2017
Rating:★★★★

Characters:

     From the very beginning I immediately felt sorry for Sugar's situation; I just wanted to reach in and give her a hug and show her she is perfect the way she is and that she doesn't have to be skinny to have a good life and have real friends. I got a little flash of "My 600lb Life" from reading about her mother and absolutely resented her for basically forcing her kids to be how they are. Skunk is just a sad excuse for a brother. I understand siblings teasing each other because we've all done it, but he takes it entirely too far and not to mention he has no room to call any names. I think the way Sugar and Even met is the most cliche and cheesy way to meet a love interest and I was not at all impressed with how it was introduced. I don't like the "insta-friendship" and "insta-love" between Sugar and Even I wish they would have had to actually work for it a little harder.

Plot & Overall:

     Sugar's struggle with binge eating and then feeling bad for it afterwards is definitely real life relatable. I felt bad that she had no support system at home what so ever because her immediate family, all except her eldest  brother Henry, downed her just as much  as everyone else in town did. Her incredible talent and personality went unnoticed because of her weight problem. I was not ready for the amount of abuse tied in this book but it was very much appreciated. I thought I was just going to be dealing with emotional and mental abuse but how Deirdre went about adding the physical abuse into the plot was done very well and not in the expected way.
     
     I think this is a good book for schools to include in their assigned reading just because it hits on the bullying topic so well and it shows you don't have to be bullied just at school by strangers, but it can happen at home by your closest family members, as well. A lot of people could relate to this book and it doesn't have to pertain just to an individual with a weight problem. This was a very motivational and surprisingly emotional book that I would recommend to everyone especially people still in school that may be dealing with bullies and don't know how to handle the situation.