Friday, 6 February 2015

Lost in books #4 (Reading Challenge 2015)


It's been snowing for days, and I've been spending all my free time snuggled on the couch, reading a book after book on my beloved Kindle. I've always been a bookworm, hidden somewhere in a corner with a book in my hand, but in the last few years, I got really busy and had to give up quite a lot of my reading time. After I got my Kindle, the reading situation slightly improved, and at the beginning of this year, I decided to »join« the 2015 reading challenge I spotted on the internet.

I thought I would share a bit of that on the blog, so over the year, I'll be doing a few posts about my progress, with short reviews of the book I read and recommendations for you.  I’ve read a few books in January, and here is what I thought about them:


In my teenage days, I’ve read a countless amount of silly teenage romance books. They are, essentially, all the same. A young girl, that is so much different than the others, falls in love with a boy. There is a much expected plot twist, and after a while, everything is mysteriously resolved, and they live happily ever after.

The Girl Online is more or less the same, where the main character is a blogger, very similar to the “author” Zoe Sugg herself. Throughout the book, I could shake the feeling, that the book was specifically written to please the masses of young girls that are obsessed with Zoella (Zoe Sugg) and wish nothing else than to become exactly like her.


I was quite disappointed, I expected something completely different and better, because I’ve read and watched Zoe for years now, and hoped she would take the book more seriously. Still, if you have an hour or two to spare, it doesn’t take long to read it, and you can decide for yourself.

I’m not even sure how this book got on my Kindle, but it was there, and I decided to read it. I’m really glad I did, because I quite enjoyed it. Euphoria is a story about three young anthropologists, their life on the field and the love triangle that forms between them. The story (though fictional) is inspired by the life of Margaret Mead, one of the most famous anthropologists.

 I’ve especially enjoyed this book, because I had an exam in anthropology last year, and even though the exam was hard, I really enjoyed the subject, therefore I also really liked the book.

It was quite short, I finished it in an afternoon, but really enjoyable. 


The book is set in seventeenth century Amsterdam, where the main character, Nella, moves to start a life with her new husband Johannes. As her wedding gift, he presents her with a cabinet size replica of their home and she decides to hire a miniaturist, to furnish and decorate the miniature house she got. After that a series of unusual, and unexpected events started to happen and left me completely confused. 

This book is really strange, I had me confused the whole time I was reading, and I couldn’t put it down, hoping that all will be resolved at the end, but as I sit here, having read it a few days ago, I still don’t know what exactly happened.

The idea and the style of writing started out very promising, but the ending left me completely unsatisfied, feeling like I have been tricked into liking something, that turned out to be unworthy of my attention.


There are three books in the series (The Selection, The Elite and The One) with the addition of a few stories, that describe the events from the viewpoints of different characters. The story is set in a dystopian world, a kingdom that used to be part of the USA. We follow the main character, America, who gets selected as one of 35 girls, which are sent to the castle to compete for the affections of the prince.

Sounds familiar? Yes, you are not mistaken, this sound like a version of a dystopian Bachelor. And that is basically all there is to the book. You have to get through all three books to get to the ending, that you knew was going to happen, wandering why you even bothered with reading.

But if you are a lover of dystopian genre as I am, this might be a nice, light, “brains-off” holiday read for you.


Looking back through reviews, I haven’t had the best of luck picking books, but at least I got back into reading, and right now I can’t wait to finish this post, get my Kindle and start reading again.

Did you read any of these books? What did you think about them? Also, I’d love to know what is your favorite book, so I can maybe add it on my to- read list?

Thanks for reading and see you in my next post!
Rawr,
your Beautysaur

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